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FA STREET 8, SMITH PUBLICATION 



E FROM PROCYOP 

i Nat Schachner H 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 

Jack Williamson 

A MATTER OF SIZE 

Harry Bat as 
1.0/^ Charles Fort 














r 



T 



. wt RlO\S IM»G £ST CRED 'r Jt 

MOST SENSATIONAL VALUES 

Vo ttuJ<C 

50,000 Ciiat&mj&Li 





$2.88 a month 

HC-14 . . Elegantly hand pierced and 
engraved, 18-K solid white gold ring: 
dazzling, genuine blue-white diamond 
in the square prong center, FOUR 
smaller genuine diamonds on sides. 
Special price 529.75 —only 52.88 a mo. 




Both 
Rings 
for 

& •" *32 S3 

$3.15 a month 

HC* 15 . Perfectly matched, .hand engraved, 
18-K solid white gold "step-effect" engage*' 
ment and wedding ensemble at a sensation- 
ally low- price. Fiery, genuine blue-white 
diamond In engagement ring- FIVE matched : 
genuine diamonds in the wedding ring. A 
$45.00 value. Now only $32.60 for both ringfc 1 " 
$3.15 a month. 

IF PURCHASED SEPARATELY 
HC-15A . . Engagement, ring only . $19.75 
$1.88 a month 

HC-15B . . Wedding ring only $13.50 
$ l .25 a month 





$1.59 a month 

HC-9 . . . Elegantly engraved modern Bagu- 
ette type wrist watch, white lifetime case: 
l fully guaranteed movement; latest link brace- 
let to match. SI 6. 95 — only SI. 59 a month.: 



,n 



HC-2 . . A real gift for the "He-Man"! 
Modern step-effect I0-K solid yellow 
gold signet ring; brilliant, genuine dia- 
mond and 2 solid white gold initials in 
genuine onyx. Specify initials desired. 
Special price $17.95 — Only $1.70 a 7no. 



STARTLING VALUES 
LIBERAL TERMS 

Royal’s stiper-values for 1934 — Espe- 
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Just send $1.00, your name, address and 
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10 DAYS FREE TRIAL 

Take 10 days free trial! If you can 
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SATISFACTION GUARANTEED 

Written Guarantee Gold Bond with 
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*22 



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32 page catalog 



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ADVERTISING SECTION 




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City State Occupation 

It you reside in Canada , send this coupon to the International Correspondence Schools Canadian, Limited , Montreal , Canada 



AST-1 



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On Sale Third Wednesday of Each Month 




A STREET & SMITH PUBLICATION 



The entire contents of this magazine are protected by copyright, and must not be reprinted without the publishers’ permission. 



Table of Contents 

Feature Novel: 

HE FROM PROCYON . 92 

Our thought-variant for April 
by Nat Schachner 

Novelette: 

A MATTER OF SIZE 38 

A carefully calculated phenomenon 
by Harry Bates 

Serial Novel: 

THE LEGION OF SPACE (Part One) ... 10 

A full book-length science novel 
by Jack Williamson 

Short Stories: 

THE GREEN PLAGUE 30 

by Stanton A. Coblentz 



THE GOD BOX 75 

by Howard Von Drey 

THE ATOM-SMASHER 85 

by Donald Wandrei 

THE TOOTH 37 

by Neil Moran 

:t Feature: 

LO! (Part One) 146 



The greatest collection of super-science data 
by Charles Fort 

Readers’ Department: 

BRASS TACKS 156 

The Open House of Controversy 
EDITOR’S PAGE 9 



Cover Painting by Howard V. Brown 



Single Copy, 20 Cents Yearly Subscription, $2.00 

Monthly publication issued by Street & Smith Publications, Inc., 79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York N Y 
George C. Smith, Jr., President; Ormond V. Gould, Vice President and Treasurer; Artemas Holmes, Vice President 
, Copyright, 1934, by Street & Smith Publications, Inc., New York. Copyright, 1934, by Street & 
Smith Publications, Inc., Great Britain. Entered as Second-class Matter, September 13, 1933, at the Post Office at 
New York N. Y , under Act of Congress of March 3, 1879. Subscriptions to Cuba, Dorn. Republic, Haiti, Spain 
Central and South American Countries except The Guianas and British Honduras, $2.25 per year. To all other 
Foreign Countries, including The Guianas and British Honduras, $2.75 per year. . _ 

We do not accept responsibility for the return of unsolicited manuscripts. 1 6 

To facilitate handling, the author should inclose a self-addressed envelope with the requisite postage attached. 

STREET & SMITH PUBLICATIONS, INC., 79 7th AVE., NEW YORK, N. Y. 



ADVERTISING SECTION 




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' MARY’S RIGHT. I > 

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V Avo., N, Y, C. 



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Hold your job. I'll not only train you in a few hours of your 
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structions, which you should master quickly, for doing 28 Radio J. E. SMITH, President 
jobs common in most every neighborhood. I give you Radio National Radio Institute 
Equipment for conducting experiments and making tests that 

teach you to build and service practically every type of receiv- The man who has directed tha 
ing set made. Cleo T. Retter, 30 W. Beechwood Ave., Dayton, tome-stadv Training of mor® 
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Croy^/lb N?* Douglas! J. E. SMITH, President, Dept. 4CD 
Bronson. Michigan. National Radi ° In8titute ’ Washington, D. C. 

J. E. SMITH, President, Dept. 4CD 
National Radio Institute, Washington, D. C. 

Dear Mr. Smith: Without ob ligating me, send your book which points out 

the spare time and full time job opportunities in Radio and your 50-50 method 
of training men at home in spare time to become Radio Experts. 

(Please print plainly.) 



NAME AGE.. 

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ADVERTISING SECTION 



WANTED- MEN FOR 

TEA- COFFEE ROUTES 



make up to a meek 




NO EXPERIENCE NEEDED— I WILL GIVE YOU 
WHAT LITTLE TRAINING NECESSARY— NO 
RED TAPE-EARNINGS START AT ONCE 



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put money in the bank — or what- 
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TEA AN® COFFEE 
ROUTES PAY BEST 

Everybody knows there is noth- 
ing better than a good weekly route 
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pay far better than 
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on your route regularly. 

YOUR OWN FOOD PRODUCTS 
AT WHOLESALE PRICES 

When I send you instructions for 
making money on my new neigh- 
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I also give you rock-bottom whole- 
sale prices on your own groceries 
and household necessities. This is 




in addition to your regular daily 
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things you use in your home. 

GO TO WORK AT ONCE 

My new plan provides immediate 
cash earnings. As long as you are 
honest and reliable you are eligible 
for one of these routes. I want 
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live. Better send name today. 

EXPERIENCE OR TRAINING 
UNNECESSARY 

I am not nearly as much interested in 
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Coffee, Spices. 

Extracts and 
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customers on your 
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is no stock to 
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NO MORE “PENNY PINCHING” 

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With my route plan you can stop time- 




LOOK AT THESE 
UNUSUAL EARNINGS 

I am receiving glowing reports from both 
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comb, N. Y., made $24.00 in one day. Wm. 
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It’s no wonder people in- 
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I’ll explain all of this more 

fully in the big booklet 

that I will send you free just 'as soon 
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vertised nationwide to millions of people. 
There is nothing new or untried about any 
of ray plans. 

DON’T SEND MONEY- 
JUST YOUR NAME 

Don’t confuse this with anything you have 
ever read before. I don't need your money 
— I need people to operate 
good paying routes. Send 
me your name so I can 
lay the facts before you, 
then you can decide if the 
earning possibilities 
are satisfactory. Don't 
expect me to wait in- 
definitely to hear 
from you. If you act 
promptly it will indi- 
cate you aro the right 
person for the route. 
Send name on coupon 
or penny postcard for 
free facts. Do it today. 

3 THINGS TO DO 

1. Mail Coupon 

2. Read Facts 

3. Start Making Money 
at once 



clock punching 
forever. If you 
want earnings 
that run up to 
$42.50 a week 
you can have 
them. Your 
weekly income is 
limited only by 
the time you give 
to the business. 
The more time 
you devote to my 
wonderful Route 
Plan, the more 
money you make 
for yourself. 
That’s the kind 
of an offer I am 
making to you. 



TEAWCOFFEE route coupon 



ALBERT MILLS, President 

5008 Monmouth Ave., Cincinnati, Ohio 

Send me full particulars of Tea and Coffee 
Route Plan, showing how I can get started 
earning up to $42.50 a week at once. This is 
without obligation to me. 




Name. 



I 



(Please Print or Write Plainly) 



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ADVERTISING SECTION 




kadtke Speed, 
amt Foment 
that 



'+0&VW 



— So has. 
the 1334 



Harley* 

f^AVIDSC 



■ Harley-Davidson Motor Co., Dept. SS. ^Milwaukee, Wis. 

I Interested in the ‘ 'FiarhtinffgHeart. ” Send illustrated literature 

Postage Stamp is enclosed to coyer cost of mailing. 



^7 he Jpietotcy-clc 
with the, FIBMTINS HEART 



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SUPER-SCIENCE 

I hope you were surprised and pleased last month when Astounding 
jumped to 160 pages. I hope you feel with me that we are beginning 
to hit a stride which stimulates and keeps us on our toes. 

Really we are trying to make our magazine what we have always 
believed it should be — alive, progressive, thought-producing. 

We have tried conscientiously to weed out what did not seem 
worth-while and to initiate new ideas in super-science. We have not 
spared expense in reaching toward that goal. 

One by one we are eliminating the weaker spots; strengthening 
them. 

One by one we are adding new foods for rational discussion. 

The thought-variants have injected new life into a held which 
was rutted by habit-driven vehicles. We sought variant ideas, sug- 
gested them, and they have blossomed into a hne series. The writers 
feel free to come to us now and suggest new themes which they have 
feared to tackle. 

Lo! brings us a most amazing fact-feature serial. Actual facts 
which, because they astound and confuse science, are super-science. I 
shall expect to see lively discussions in “Brass Tacks” as the evidence 
of unknown forces builds up our case for super-science. 

“Brass Tacks” is your department. This page is my point of 
expression. I want you to feel free to discuss our magazine without 
my having a last word. The headlines over the letters are our answers 
— the headlines plus this page. Here I can talk to you; there you can 
talk to me, and to each other. 

When you talk to me, I listen. That’s why our magazine is gain- 
ing in interest and value as the months pass. But one thing we need. 
We who read science-fiction are clannish in our group interests. We 
are growing, but if we are to maintain and increase our stride you 
owe it to me — every one of you — to interest one new reader in 
Astounding Stories. 

If each of you will do this for me, I will promise that the progres- 
sive interest of the last few issues will seem only the beginning by a 
year from today. 

Let’s work together — all the way. 



The Editor. 





The Legion of Space 

A fall hook-length serial 
of Super- science 

Crashing into the unknown future 
of the Universe 

by JACK WILLIAMSON 

Illustrated by Howard V. Brown 
In Six Parts. Part One. 



The great vane had swung out — the hideous thing in the car was 
dropping into the fort! 




t- 



12 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



ELL, DOCTOR GRAY, 
how do you find me?” 
Hopefully, old John 
Delmar searched my face with his 
oddly keen blue eyes. 

“Sound as a bell — except, of 
course, the knee. I’ve a good pa- 
tient in you,” I predicted confi- 
dently, “for twenty years yet.” 

John Delmar shook his gray head, 
very quiet, very earnest. “No, doc- 
tor,” he said, with the same calm 
certainty in his tone as if he had 
been stating that the sun was shin- 
ing; “no, doctor, I shall be dead by 
eleven o’clock on the morning of 
the twenty-third.” 

“Nonsense!” I protested. 

“I know, doctor, that I shall die 
on the morning of the twenty-third,” 
he insisted, with the same quiet cer- 
tainty. “For years, I’ve known. I 
came this morning simply to see if 
you could tell me what I’m to 
die of.” 

“You can just forget the notion,” 
I heartily assured him. “If twenty 
thousand dollars’ worth of equip- 
ment can tell me anything about 

your condition ” 

“Don’t think I question your skill, 
Doctor Gray. But I’m quite posi- 
tive. You see, doctor,” he added 
hesitantly, “I’ve a very unusual gift. 
I’ve meant, sometime, to tell you 

about it. If you’d care to hear ” 

And he paused, diffidently. 

I had wondered, for years, about 
John Delmar. A faded, stiff little 
man, with thin gray hair and blue 
eyes that were curiously bright, 
strangely young. Still very erect, 
he walked with a slight, soldierly 
limp, from a troublesome old bullet 
wound in his knee. 

He was oddly reticent. I had 
been, I suppose, his most intimate 
friend; yet he had given me only 
the barest outline of a life that must 
have been unusually interesting. I 



knew that he had begun his long 
career as a fighting man in the old 
West; that he had known “Billy the 
Kid,” had been town marshal, stock 
detective, express guard, a Texas 
Ranger. I knew that he had served 
in the Rough Riders, in the Boer 
War, under Porfirio Diaz, at last in 
the British army — to make up, he 
said, for fighting the British in 
South Africa. I was aware, too, that 
he was busy upon some literary proj- 
ect — in his rather shabby rooms I 
had often seen his desk piled with 
manuscript. But until he came to 
the office that morning for the exam- 
ination, I had no inkling of what his 
life really was. 

No patient was waiting, and his 
quiet certainty about the hour of 
his death piqued my curiosity. 

“I’d be glad to hear,” I told him. 

“IT’S A good thing most fight- 
ing men are killed before they get 
too old to fight,” John Delmar be- 
gan, a little awkwardly, settling 
back in his chair and easing his stiff 
knee with thin old hands. “That’s 
what I was thinking, one morning 
in 1919. 

“I’d just come home to New York, 
Doctor Gray. Or I called it coming 
home; it was a city of strangers, 
with no time for old fighting men. 
There was nothing for me to do; I 
was simply a useless human wreck. 
One cold, wet spring morning — 
April 13th, it was, I remember — I 
sat down on a bench in Central Park 
to think things over. And I decided 
— well, that I’d already lived too 
long. 

“I was just getting up from the 
bench to go back to the room and 
get my automatic, when I — remem- 
bered. 

“Memory! I suppose one must 
call it that. It’s strange, though, to 
speak of remembering things that 




THE LEGION OF SPACE 



13 



haven’t happened yet ; that won’t 
happen, some of them, for a thou- 
sand years. But there’s no other 
word. 

“I’ve talked to scientists about it, 
doctor. A psychologist, first; a be- 
haviorist; and he laughed. It didn’t 
fit in, he said, with the concepts of 
behaviorism. A man, he said, is just 
a machine; everything he does is 
just mechanical reaction to stimuli. 

“But if that’s so, there are stimuli 
that the psychologists haven’t ana- 
lyzed yet. 

“I found another scientist, who 
didn’t laugh. A physicist from Ox- 
ford, a lecturer on Einstein — rela- 
tivity. He didn’t laugh. He seemed 
to believe what I told him and asked 
questions about my — memories. But 
there wasn’t much I could tell him, 
then. 

“Space and time, apart, aren’t real, 
he told me. And they aren’t really 
different. They fade one into the 
other all about us. He spoke of 
the continuum and two-way time. I 
didn’t understand it all. But there’s 
no reason, he said, why we shouldn’t 
remember the future, all of us. In 
theory, he said, our minds should be 
able to trace world-lines into the 
future as well as into the past. 

“Hunches and premonitions and 
dreams, he believed, are sometimes 
real memories of things yet to come. 
I didn’t understand all he said; but 
I did understand enough to know 
that the thing wasn’t — well, insan- 
ity. I had been afraid. 

“He wanted to know about what 
I — remembered. But that was years 
ago. It was just scattered impres- 
sions, then, most of them vague and 
confused. It’s a power, I think, that 
all people have, to some degree — it 
simply happens to be better devel- 
oped in me. I’ve always had 
hunches, premonitions. But the first 
clear memory of the future came 



that day in the Park. And it was 
years before I could call them up 
at will. 

“You don’t understand the thing, 
I suppose, doctor. I’ll try to de- 
scribe that first experience in the 
Park. I slipped on the wet pave- 
ment and fell back on the bench — 
I wasn’t so long out of the hospital, 
then, you know. And then I wasn’t 
in the Park at all. 

“I was still falling, all right, and 
in the same position. But I was 
on a weird plain. It was blazing 
with light, pitted with thousands of 
craters, ringed with mountains 
higher than any I had ever seen. 
The Sun was beating down out of a 
blue sky dark as midnight and full 
of stars. There was another queer 
luminary, huge and green. 

“A fantastic black machine was 
flying over the mountains. Larger 
than one would believe possible and 
utterly strange. It had just struck 
me with some weapon; I was reel- 
ing back under the agony of the 
wound. 

“It was some time before I real- 
ized that I had been on the Moon, 
in a great crater; that the green 
crescent had been the Earth itself. 
And the realization only increased 
my bewilderment. It was a year be- 
fore I understood that I was devel- 
oping an ability to recall the future; 
that I’d seen an incident in the con- 
quest of the Moon by the Medusae, 
in the thirtieth century — they mur- 
dered the human colonists. 

“The faculty improves with prac- 
tice, like any other. It’s simply 
telepathy, I’m convinced, across 
time, not merely through space. 
Just remember they’re neither one 
real. 

“At first I got contact only with 
minds under great stress. Still, 
there are difficulties. But I’ve fol- 
lowed human history pretty well 



14 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



through the next thousand years. 
That’s what I’ve been writing — the 
history of the future. 

“The conquest of space thrills me 
most. Partly because it’s the most 
difficult thing men ever did, the 
most daring and the most danger- 
ous. And partly, I suppose, because 
my own descendants played a pretty 
big part in it.” 

He paused, keen eyes on my face, 
and I kept silent until he went on, 
sure that the least show of doubt 
would stop him. 

“Yes, Doctor Gray, I’ve a son, in 
New Guinea, the last time I heard, 
looking for gold on the Bulolo 
River. We’re a roving breed, it 
seems. Anyhow, his grandson was 
killed in a rocket that exploded in 
the stratosphere — I say ‘was’ ; it 
happened in 1974. 

“His grandson landed on the 
Moon, asphyxiated before he struck. 
James Delmar brought his body 
back in 2140 and discovered radium 
there. Peden Delmar established 
the first colony a hundred years 
later, over the radium mine — he had 
to build an air-tight city. 

“Peden’s son Zane patented the 
geodyne — a vast improvement over 
the first clumsy rockets. He died 
horribly of a strange jungle fever 
contracted on Venus. But his three 
sons carried on his work and made a 
vast fortune from the geodyne. 

“In the next century, all the solar 
system was pretty well explored, as 
far as the moon of Neptune. It was 
fifty years more before a John Ulnar 
reached Pluto — the name was 

changed about that time from Del- 
mar to Ulnar to fit a new system of 
identification. His fuel was ex- 
hausted, so he couldn’t return. John 
lived four years alone on the Black 
Planet and left a diary that his 
nephew found after two decades of 



searching. A strange document, 
that! 

“It was Mary Ulnar — a queer 
Amazonian woman she must have 
been — who began the conquest of 
the silica-armored desert life of 
Mars. And Arthur Ulnar, her son, 
led the first fleet in the long war 
with the weird, half-metallic beings 
who had extended their own rule 
over the four great moons of Jupiter 
— he was lost, with all his ships. * 

“More battles, though, were 
fought in the laboratory than in 
space. Explorers and colonists met 
terrific, endless difficulties with bac- 
teria, atmospheres, gravitations, 
chemical dangers. As planetary en- 
gineers, the Ulnars contributed a 
full share to the science that, with 
gravity-generators, synthetic atmos- 
phere, and artificial climate control, 
could transform a frozen, stony 
asteroid into a veritable paradise. 

“And they reaped a generous re- 
ward. A dark chapter of the fam- 
ily history begins with the twenty- 
sixth century. The Ulnars had con- 
quered space and seized the spoil. 
They almost controlled interplan- 
etary commerce ; finally their wealth 
dominated the system. 

“One Eric Ulnar had himself 
crowned as Eric the First, Emperor 
of the Sun. For two hundred years 
the family ruled the system as abso- 
lute despots. Their reign, I’m sorry 
to say, was savagely oppressive. 
There were endless outbreaks for 
liberty, cruelly put down. 

“Adam the Third, however, was 
finally forced to abdicate — he had 
made the mistake of antagonizing 
science. The Green Hall Council 
began the first real democratic rule 
of history. For another two centu- 
ries, a genuine civilization existed 
in the system, defended by a little 
body of picked, trained fighting 
men, the legion of space. 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 



15 



“It was a brief golden age, broken 
when another Eric Ulnar ventured 
away into space, the first man to 
reach another star. He got to the 
sun we know as Barnard’s Runaway 
Star, the two nearer having proved 
to possess no planets — and he 
brought terror and suffering and the 
shadow of doom upon the human 
race. 

“His mad ambition brought war 
between our system and another. 
An invasion of unthinkable horror 
from an alien star! It was the very 
crisis of history- — almost the end of 
human history. Then there was an 
epic achievement by a few men of 
the legion — one of them another Ul- 
nar — that is perhaps the most heroic 
thing men ever did. John Ulnar— 
his name must have come down 
from me.” 

ANOTHER patient was an- 
nounced just then. And stiff, wrin- 
kled, keen-eyed little John Delmar 
started to his feet; a vision seemed 
to fade from his eyes. He protested 
that he must not waste my time. 

“I must be going, Doctor Gray,” 
he said. And he added quietly: 
“But you see how I know I’ll die on 
the morning of the twenty-third. 

“I remember!” 

“You’re fit as a fiddle,” I insisted 
again. “I wish I were as sound as 
you are. But it’s a strange thing 
you’ve told me. I’m very much in- 
terested; I’d like to see the manu- 
script you mentioned. Why don’t 
you publish it?” 

“Perhaps, Doctor Gray,” he re- 
plied. “But so few would believe, 
and I don’t like to expose myself to 
charges of fraud.” 

And he refused to stay, though I 
should have been glad to let the 
other patient wait, while I heard 
more of his strange “memories.” 

He took to bed, a week later, with 



influenza. I expected at first to 
have him back on his feet in a few 
days. But pulmonary complications 
interfered, and he died at 10:55, on 
the morning of March 23rd. 

Whatever others may decide, I 
was pretty well convinced, even be- 
fore his death. He at first wished 
to have his manuscript destroyed, 
but I persuaded him to leave it in 
my hands. As mere fiction, it would 
be enormously interesting. As a 
real prevision of future history, it 
is more than fascinating. 

The selection that follows deals 
with the adventures of John Star — 
born John Ulnar — a soldier in the 
legion of space, in the thirtieth cen- 
tury, when the unearthly Medusae 
brought alien horror and black 
threat of doom to humanity. 

II. 

“I’M REPORTING, Major Stell, 
for orders.” 

John Star, lean and trim in his 
spotlessly new legion uniform, stood 
at attention before the desk where 
the erect, white-haired, grim-faced 
old officer sat toying with the sil- 
ver model of a space cruiser. 

“Are you ready, John Ulnar, to 
accept your first order in the legion 
as it should be accepted, to put duty 
above everything else?” 

“I hope so, sir. I believe so.” 

John Star was then called John 
Ulnar; the “Star” is a title of dis- 
tinction given him later by the 
Green Hall Council. John Star we 
shall call him, according to the 
Green Hall’s edict. 

This day, one of the first in the 
thirtieth century, had been the su- 
preme, the most thrilling day of his 
twenty-one years. It marked the 
end of his five arduous years in the 
legion academy, on Catalina Island. 

Where, he wondered eagerly, 



16 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



would his duty begin? On some 
cruiser of the legion patrol, in the 
cold wastes of space? At some iso- 
lated outpost in the exotic, terrible 
jungles of Venus? Or perhaps in 
the guard of the Green Hall itself? 
He strove to conceal his consuming 
impatience. 

“John Ulnar,” old Major Stell 
spoke at last, with maddening de- 
liberation, “I hope you realize the 
meaning of duty.” 

“I think I do, sir.” 

“Because,” the officer continued 
as slowly, “you are being assigned 
to a duty that is peculiarly impor- 
tant.” 

“What is it, sir?” 

“John Ulnar, you are being given 
a duty that has previously been in- 
trusted only to seasoned veterans of 
the legion. It surprised me, I may 
say, that you were selected for it. 
Your lack of experience will be a 
disadvantage to you.” 

“Not too much of one, I hope, 
sir!” 

“The orders for your assignment, 
John Ulnar, came directly from 
Commander Ulnar himself. Does it 
happen that you are related to the 
commander of the legion, and his 
nephew, Eric Ulnar, the explorer?” 
“Yes, sir, distantly.” 

“That must explain it, then. But 
if you fail in this duty, John Ulnar, 
don’t expect any favor of the com- 
mander to save you from the conse- 
quences.” 

“No, sir. Of course not!” 

“The service to which you are 
being assigned, John Ulnar, is not 
well known. It is, in fact, secret. 
But it is the most important that 
can be intrusted to a soldier of the 
legion. Your responsibility will be 
to the Green Hall itself. Any fail- 
ure, I may warn you, even if due 
only to negligence, will mean dis- 



grace and very severe punishment.” 
“Yes, sir.” 

“John Ulnar, did you ever hear 
of AKKA?” 

“Akka? I think not, sir.” 

“It isn’t ‘akka.’ AKKA— it’s a 
symbol.” 

“Yes, sir. What does it mean?” 
“Men have given their lives to 
learn that, John Ulnar. And men 
have died for knowing. Only one 
person in the system knows pre- 
cisely what those four letters stand 
for. That person is a young woman. 
The most important single duty of 
the legion is to guard her.” 

“Yes, sir.” A breathless whisper. 
“Because, John Ulnar, AKKA is 
the most precious thing that hu- 
manity possesses. I need not tell 
you what it is. But the loss of it, 
I may say — the loss of the young 
woman who knows it — would mean 
unprecedented disaster to human- 
ity.” 

“Yes, sir.” He waited, painfully. 
“I could assign you to no duty 
more important, John Ulnar, than to 
join the few trusted men who guard 
that young woman. And to no duty 
more perilous. For desperate men 
know that AKKA exists, know that 
possession of it would enable them 
to dictate to the Green Hall — or to 
destroy it. 

“No risk, or no difficulty, will de- 
ter them from attempting to get 
possession of the young woman, to 
force the secret from her. You must 
be unceasingly alert against at- 
tempts by stealth or violence. The 
girl — and AKKA — must be pro- 
tected at any cost.” 

“Yes, sir. Where is the girl?” 
“That information can’t be given 
you, John Ulnar, until you are out 
in space. The danger that you 
might pass it on, unwittingly or 
otherwise, is too great. The girl’s 
safety depends on her whereabouts 

AST— 1 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 



17 



being kept secret. If they became 
known — the whole legion fleet 
would be required to defend her. 

“But you are assigned, John 
Ulnar, to join the guard of AKKA. 
You will report at once, at the 
Green Hall, to Captain Eric Ulnar 
and place yourself under his orders. 

“Under Eric Ulnar!” 

He was astonished and overjoyed 
to know that he was to serve under 
his famous kinsman, the great ex- 
plorer of space, just returned from 
his daring voyage beyond the lim- 
its of the system, to the strange star 
Yarkand. 

“Yes. John Ulnar, I hope you 
never forget the overwhelming im- 
portance of the duty before you. 
That is all.” 

Queer ly, John Star’s heart ached 
at leaving the old campus of the 
academy, parting from his class- 
mates. Queerly, for he was a-thrill 
with eagerness. Mystery lay ahead, 
the promise of peril, the adventure 
of meeting his famous kinsman. 
With native optimism, he ignored 
Major Stell’s grim hints of the pos- 
sibility of disastrous failure. 

FROM THE ports of the descend- 
ing strato-flyer, that afternon, John 
Star first saw the Green Hall — seat 
of the supreme council of the 
united planets. 

Like a great emerald, it shim- 
mered darkly cool in a waste of 
brown, sun-baked New Mexico mesa 
— a colossal marvel of green, trans- 
lucent glass. Three thousand feet 
the square central tower leaped up, 
crowned with the landing stage to 
which the strato-plane was drop- 
ping. The four great colonnaded 
wings spread over a full mile of 
luxuriantly verdant parkland — a 
solitary jewel in the desert, under 
the rugged, mile-high wall of the 
Sandias. 

AST— 2 



John Star was a- throb with eager- 
ness to see Eric Ulnar, then in the 
full radiance of his fame for com- 
manding the first successful expe- 
dition beyond the system — if an ex- 
pedition can be called successful 
when but a fourth of its members 
returned, and most of those dying 
of a fearful malady involving insan- 
ity and hideous bodily disfigure- 
ment. 

Dark chapters, and silent ones, 
were in the story of the voyage. But 
the public, like John Star, had ig- 
nored them. Honors had been show- 
ered on Eric Ulnar, while most of 
his companions lay forgotten in hos- 
pital cells, gibbering madly of the 
eldritch horrors of Yarkand’s soli- 
tary planet, while their bodies rot- 
ted away unspeakably, beyond the 
aid or the understanding of medical 
science. 

John Star found Eric Ulnar wait- 
ing for him in a private room in the 
vast Green Hall. Long golden hair 
and slender figure made the young 
officer almost femininely handsome. 
Burning eyes, haughty manner, pro- 
claimed unchecked passion and in- 
solent pride. Retreating chin, ir- 
resolute mouth, betrayed the man’s 
fatal weakness. 

“John Ulnar, I believe you are a 
relative of mine?” 

“I believe I am, sir,” said John 
Star, concealing a stab of disap- 
pointment that pierced even through 
his admiration. He stood at atten- 
tion, while the arrogant eyes of Eric 
Ulnar boldly scanned his trim, mili- 
tary figure, small-boned, but hard 
and capable from the five grinding 
years of academy training. 

“You are under some obligation, 
I believe, to Adam Ulnar?” 

“I am, sir. I am an orphan. It 
was the commander of the legion 
who got me the academy appoint- 
ment. But for that, I might never 



18 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



have been able to enter the legion.” 
“Adam Ulnar is my uncle. He had 
me select you for the duty ahead. 
I hope you will serve me loyally.” 
“Of course, sir. Aside from the 
obligation, you are my superior in 
the legion.” 

Eric Ulnar smiled; for a moment 
his face was almost attractive, in 
spite of its weakness and its pride. 

“I’m sure we shall get on,” he 
said. “But I shall want services of 
you as a kinsman that I couldn’t 
ask of you as my subordinate in the 
legion.” 

John Star wondered what such 
services might be. He could not 
hide the fact that Eric Ulnar was 
not all he had hoped of the heroic 
explorer of space. Something about 
him roused a vague distaste, though 
this man had been his idol. 

“You’re ready to start for our 
post?” 

“Of course.” 

“We shall go aboard the cruiser, 
then, at once.” 

“We’re leaving the Earth?” 
“You’ll serve yourself best, John,” 
Eric Ulnar said, with an air of inso- 
lent superiority, “by obeying my or- 
ders and asking no questions.” 

An elevator lifted them to the 
glittering confusion of the landing 
stage on the green glass tower. The 
Scorpion was waiting for them 
there, a swift new space cruiser, ta- 
peringly cylindrical, a bare hundred 
feet long, all silver-white save for 
black projecting rockets. 

Two legionnaires met them at the 
air lock, came with them aboard — 
Vors, lean, stringy, rat-faced; Kimp- 
len, tall, haggard-eyed, wolfish. 
Both years older than John Star; 
both, he soon found, veterans of the 
Yarkand expedition — among the few 
who had escaped the mysterious 
malady — they displayed for his in- 
experience a patronizing contempt 



that annoyed him. It was strange, 
he thought, that men of their type 
should have been chosen to guard 
the infinitely precious AKKA. He 
would not, he thought, care to trust 
either of them with the price of a 
meal, much less v/ith the system’s 
most valuable possession. 

The Scorpion was provisioned, 
fueled, her crew of ten aboard and 
at their posts. Air lock quickly 
sealed, multiple rockets vomiting 
blue flame, she flashed through the 
atmosphere into the freedom of the 
void. 

A thousand miles off, safe in the 
frozen, star-domed vacuum of space, 
the navigator cut out the rockets. 
At an order from Eric Ulnar, he 
set the cruiser’s nose for the far red 
spark of Mars, started the geodyne 
generators. 

Quietly humming, their powerful 
fields reacting against, altering, the 
curvature of space itself, the geo- 
dynes — more technically, electro- 
magnetic geodesic deflectors — drove 
the Scorpion across the hundred 
million miles to Mars, with an ac- 
celeration and a final velocity that 
science had once declared impos- 
sible. 

Forgetting his uneasy mistrust of 
Vors and Kimplen, John Star en- 
joyed the voyage. The eternal mira- 
cles of space fascinated him through 
long hours. Ebon sky; frozen pin 
points of stars, many-colored, mo- 
tionless; silver clouds of nebula? ; 
the supernal Sun, blue, winged with 
red flame. 

Three meals were served in the 
narrow galley. After twenty hours, 
the geodynes — too powerful for safe 
maneuver in the close vicinity of a 
planet — were stopped. The Scor- 
pion fell, checked by rocket blasts, 
toward the night side of the planet 
Mars. 

Standing by the navigator, Eric 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 



19 



Ulnar gave him directions from 
some private memorandum. About 
the whole proceeding was an air of 
mystery, of secret haste, of daring 
unknown dangers, that mightily in- 
terested John Star. Yet he had the 
sense of something irregular; he was 
troubled by a little haunting fear 
that all was not as it should be. 

ON A STONY Martian desert 
they landed, far, apparently, from 
any city or inhabited fertile “canal.” 
Low, dark hills loomed near in the 
starlight. John Star, with Eric Ul- 
nar and rat-faced Vors and wolfish 
Kimplen, disembarked; beside them 
was lowered their meager baggage 
and a little pile of freight. 

Four legionnaires came up pres- 
ently through the darkness, the part 
of the guard, John Star understood, 
that they had come to relieve. They 
went aboard, after their leader had 
exchanged some documents with 
Eric Ulnar; the valve clanged be- 
hind them. Blue flame jetted from 
the rockets; the Scorpion roared 
away, a dwindling blue comet, soon 
lost amid the blazing Martian stars. 

John Star and the others waited 
in the desert for days. The Sun 
burst up suddenly, shrunken and 
blue, after the briefest dawn, flood- 
ing the red landscape abruptly with 
harsh radiance. 

A scarlet plain, weirdly and 
grimly desolate. Lonely wastes of 
ocher drift sand, rippled with low, 
crescent dunes. Cruel, jutting 
ridges of red volcanic rock, pro- 
jecting from yellow sand like broken 
fangs. Solitary boulders, carved by 
pitiless wind-driven sand into gro- 
tesque scarlet monsters. 

Crouching above the plain were 
the hills. Low, ancient, worn down 
by erosion of ages immemorial, like 
all the mountains of dying Mars. 
Tumbled masses of red stone; 



broken palisades of red-black, co- 
lumnar rock; ragged, wind-carved 
precipices. 

Sprawling across the hilltop was 
an ancient, half-ruined fort. Mas- 
sive walls rambled along the rims 
of the precipices, studded here and 
there with square, heavy towers. It 
was all of the red volcanic stone 
characteristic of the Martian desert, 
all crumbling to slow ruin. 

The fortress must date, John Star 
knew, from the conquest of the 
weird, silica-armored Martians. It 
must have been useless, abandoned, 
a full three centuries. 

But it was not now deserted. 

A sentry met them when they 
climbed to the gate, a very fat, blue- 
nosed man, in legion uniform, who 
had been dozing lazily on a bench 
in the warm sun. He examined 
Eric Ulnar’s documents with a fishy 
eye. 

“Ah, so you’re the relief guard?” 
he wheezed. “ ’Tis mortal seldom 
we see a living being here. Pass 
on, inside. Captain Otan is in his 
quarters, beyond the court.” 

Within the crumbling red walls 
they found a large, open court, sur- 
rounded with a gallery, many doors 
and windows opening upon it. In 
the center a fountain played in a 
tiny, vivid garden of flowers. Be- 
yond was a tennis court, from which 
a man and a slender girl vanished 
hastily as they entered. 

John Star’s heart leaped with ex- 
citement at sight of the girl. She 
was, he was immediately certain, the 
keeper of the mysterious AKKA. 
She was the girl he had been or- 
dered to guard. Recalling Major 
Stell’s warning of desperate, un- 
known enemies anxious to seize her, 
John Star had a little pang of appre- 
hension. The old fort was no real 
defense ; it was no more than a 
dwelling. There were, he soon 



20 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



found, only eight men to guard her, 
all told. They were armed only 
with hand proton-blast needles. 
Truly, secrecy was their only de- 
fense. If the unknown enemies dis- 
covered she was here, sent a mod- 
ern, armed ship 

During the day he learned no 
more. Eric Ulnar, Vors, and Kimp- 
len continued insolently uncommu- 
nicative; the four remaining mem- 
bers of the old guard were oddly 
distant, cautious in their talk, un- 
mistakably apprehensive. They were 
busy bringing up the supplies from 
where the Scorpion had landed — 
provisions, apparently, for many 
months. 

An hour after dark, John Star was 
in the individual room he had been 
given, which opened on the court, 
when he heard a shouted alarm. 

“Rockets! Rockets! A strange 
ship is landing!” 

Running into the yard, he saw a 
greenish flare descending athwart 
the stars, heard a thin whistling that 
increased to a screaming bellow, 
deafeningly loud. The flame, grown 
enormous, dropped beyond the east 
wall ; the bellow abruptly ceased. 
He felt a sharp tremor underfoot. 

“A great ship!” cried the sentry. 
“It landed so near it shook the hill. 
Its rockets burned green, a thing I 
never saw before.” 

Could it be, John Star wondered, 
with an odd little pause of his heart, 
that the girl’s mysterious enemies 
had learned where she was? That 
the great, mysterious ship had come 
to take her? 

Captain Otan, the commander of 
the tiny garrison, evidently had 
some such apprehension. An elderly 
thin man, very much agitated, he 
called out all the men, stationed 
them about the old walls and tow- 
ers with hand proton guns. For 
three hours John Star lay on his 



stomach, watching a crumbling re- 
doubt. But nothing happened; at 
midnight he was dismissed. 

The old officer, however, was still 
alarmed over the strange ship’s ar- 
rival. He ordered the three others 
of the old guard — Jay Kalam, Hal 
Samdu, and Giles Habibula — to re- 
main on guard. From him John Star 
caught a sense of terror and impend- 
ing doom. 

III. 

JOHN STAR found himself ab- 
ruptly sitting bolt upright in his 
bunk, staring at his open window, 
which looked into the great court- 
yard. It was not any alarm that he 
could name which had roused him; 
rather, a sudden chill of instinctive 
fear, an intuition of terror. 

An eye! It must be, he thought, 
an eye, staring in at him. But it was 
fully a foot long, ovoid, all pupil. 
Thin, ragged black membranes 
edged it. It was purple, shining in 
the darkness like a great well of 
subtly malignant luminescence. 
Mere sight of it shook him with ele- 
mental, nightmare horror. 

The briefest instant it gazed on 
him, unutterably evil, and then it 
was gone. Trembling, he scrambled 
out of bed, to give an alarm. But 
the horror of it had left him doubt- 
ful of his senses. When he heard 
one sentry hail another in the court, 
as if nothing were amiss, he decided 
that the frightful eye had been only 
a fabrication of his strained nerves. 
After all, he had heard nothing, and 
it had vanished the very instant he 
glimpsed it. It was sheer impossi- 
bility; no creature in the system had 
eyes a foot long. He went back to 
bed and tried to sleep — unsuccess- 
fully, for the picture of that fear- 
ful eye kept haunting him. 

He was up before dawn, anxious 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 



21 



to know more of the strange ship. 
Passing the weary sentries in the 
court, he climbed the spiral stair in 
the old north tower and looked out 
across the crimson landscape just at 
the abrupt sunrise. 

Dunes of yellow sand — shattered, 
weirdly eroded rock — he saw noth- 
ing else. But crumbling walls, east- 
ward, shut off his view; the vessel, 
he thought, might lie beyond them. 
His curiosity increased. If it were 
a friendly legion ship, why had the 
rockets been green? If it carried 
enemies, why had they not already 
struck? 

THE GIRL was behind John Star 
when he turned, she whom he had 
glimpsed on the tennis court and 
guessed to be keeper of AKKA. 
One glance confirmed his impres- 
sion that she was very beautiful. 
Slim and straight and cleanly 
formed; eyes cool gray, sober and 
honest; hair a lustrous brown that 
wrought magic of flame and color 
in the new sunlight. She wore a 
simple white tunic; her breast was 
heaving from the run behind him up 
the stairs. 

It was amazing, he thought, that 
one carrying such a fearful respon- 
sibility as AKKA and living always 
in the shadow of deadly peril could 
be so freshly and innocently lovely. 

“Why — why, good morning,” he 
said, a little confused, for legion 
cadets have little time to practice 
the social graces, yet very much de- 
lighted and eager to please her. “I 
came,” he said, “to look for the ship. 
But I don’t see it.” 

“But it’s very near!” she cried, 
breathless. Her voice, he perceived, 
was adorable — and alarmed. 

“Beyond the walls, perhaps.” 

“It must be.” Her gray eyes stud- 
ied him frankly, weighed him — 
warming, he thought, with approval. 



She said abruptly, voice lower: “I 
want to talk to you.” 

“I’m quite willing.” He smiled. 
“Please be serious,” she appealed 
urgently. “You are loyal? Loyal 
to the legion? To mankind?” 
“Why, of course I am! What 
do ” 

“I believe you are,” she whispered, 
gray eyes still very intent on his 
face. “I believe you really are.” 
“Why should you think anything 
else?” 

“I’ll tell you,” she said swiftly. 
“But you must keep what I say se- 
cret. Every word! Even from your 
officer, Captain Ulnar.” 

Her faee, when she spoke the 
name, tensed with a dislike that was 
almost hate. 

“If you say so. Though I don’t 



“I shall trust you. First, do you 
know why you’re here?” 

“I’ve orders to guard a girl who 
knows some mysterious secret.” 
“I’m the girl.” Her voice was 
more deliberate, more confident. 
“And the secret, AKKA, is the most 
valuable and the most dangerous 
thing in the system. I must tell 
you a little more about it than you 
seem to know. For it’s in terrible 
danger. You must help save it!” 
Quietly, then, she asked a ques- 
tion that seemed odd : 

“You know the history, I suppose, 
of the old wars between the Pur- 
ples and the Greens?” 

“Why, I think so. Purple was the 
color of the emperors. The Greens 
were the faction that revolted, set 
up the democratic Green Hall. The 
last emperor, Adam the Third, abdi- 
cated two hundred years ago?” 

“But you don’t know why he ab- 
dicated.” 

“No. No ; the books didn’t say. I 
used to wonder.” 

“Then I must tell you. It’s im- 



22 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



portant. Then, you know, the des- 
potic power of the emperors was 
supreme. They were vastly wealthy ; 
they had private space fleets. And 
they ruled with an iron cruelty. 
Every man even suspected of being 
a Green was deported to Pluto. 

“An ancestor of mine, Charles 
Anthar, was deported, because of a 
chance remark in favor of free 
speech, made to a man he thought a 
friend. The finest physicist in the 
system. He spent fourteen years in 
the terrible dungeons of the Black 
Planet. 

“On Pluto he made a scientific 
discovery. The theory he worked 
out in his dungeon by pure mathe- 
matics. It took him nine years. 
Then his fellow prisoners smuggled 
materials to him to build the appara- 
tus he had planned. It was very 
simple, but it took five years to find 
the parts. 

“When it was finished, he de- 
stroyed the prison guard. Sitting 
in his cell, he forced Adam the 
Third to obey his orders. If Adam 
had refused, Charles Anthar could 
have wrecked the solar system. 

“Since, that discovery has de- 
fended the peace of the Green Hall. 
It is so terrific that only one person 
at a time is permitted to know it. 
Only this much of it has ever been 
put in writing — an abbreviation.” 

She showed him, tattooed on her 
white palm, the letters AKKA. 

“And you are — in danger?” John 
Star whispered. 

“I am. The Purples didn’t lose 
their wealth and influence, you see. 
And they’ve always wanted to re- 
store the empire. But AKKA has 
always been safely kept by the de- 
scendants of Charles Anthar. 

“My name is Aladoree Anthar. I 
had the secret from my father, six 
years ago, before he died. 

“The Purples, of course, have 



known about it from the first. End- 
lessly they have plotted and 
schemed to get possession of it for 
themselves. With it, they’d be su- 
preme forever. And I think Eric 
Ulnar has come to take it.” 

“You must trust Eric!” protested 
John Star. “He’s a famous explorer! 
And the nephew of the commander 
of the legion.” 

“I know. That’s why I think 
we’re betrayed.” 

“Why, I don’t see ” 

“Ulnar,” she said, “was the fam- 
ily name of the emperors. Eric Ul- 
nar, I think, is the direct heir, the 
pretender to the throne. He must 
be. His scheming, plotting uncle 
was ” 

“Adam Ulnar, scheming, plot- 
ting!” John Star was outraged. 
“You call the commander that?” 

“I do! I think he used his wealth 
and influence to become commander, 
so he could find where I am hidden. 
He sent Eric here. That ship, last 
night, brought reenforcements, and 
a way to escape with me.” 
“Impossible!” gasped John Star. 
“Vors, perhaps, and Kimplen. I’ve 

suspected them. But Eric ” 

“I know it! Eric Ulnar slipped 
out of the fort last night. He was 
gone two hours. He went to com- 
municate with his allies on the 
ship.” 

“Eric Ulnar is a hero and an offi- 
cer in the legion.” 

“I would trust no man named 
Ulnar!” she flamed back. 

“My name is Ulnar,” he coldly re- 
turned. 

“Your name — Ulnar,” she whis- 
pered, shocked. “You’re kin ” 

“I am. I owe my commission to 
the commander’s generosity.” 

“Then I see,” she said bitterly, 
“why you are here!” 

“You are mistaken about Eric,” he 
insisted. 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 



23 



“Just remember,” she whipped out 
furiously, “that you are a traitor to 
the Green Hall! That you are de- 
stroying liberty and happiness!” 

With that she whirled and left 
him, breathless and disconcerted. 
Even though he had defended Eric, 
he had a little haunting doubt. The 
others, Vors and Kimplen, he mis- 
trusted deeply. The proximity of 
the strange ship had alarmed him. 
And he was very sorry, just now, 
that he had lost the confidence of 
Aladoree Anthar. It would make it 
harder to protect her — and, besides, 
he liked her. 

Eric Ulnar met him when he came 
back to the court, said, with a grim, 
sardonic smile: 

“It appears, John, that Captain 
Otan was murdered during the 
night. We’ve just found his body 
in his room.” 

IV. 

“STRANGLED, apparently,” said 
Eric Ulnar, pointing to a purple 
band that circled the dead man’s 
neck. The body lay on his bunk, 
limbs rigid in agony, thin face con- 
torted, eyes protruding, mouth set 
in an appalling grin of terror and 
pain. 

John Star bent over it, found 
other strnge marks, where the skin 
was dry, hardened into little green- 
ish scales. 

“Look at this,” he said. “Like the 
burn of some chemical. And that 
bruise — it wasn’t made by a human 
hand. A rope — perhaps ” 

“So you’re turning detective?” cut 
in Eric Ulnar, with his thin, supe- 
rior smile. “Your proclivity toward 
asking questions will get you into 
trouble yet, John. But what’s your 
theory?” 

“Last night,” he began slowly, “I 
saw something rather — dreadful. I 



thought afterward it was just a 
nightmare, until now. A huge, pur- 
ple eye. It must have been a foot 
long! And it was evil — horribly ma- 
lignant! 

“Something must have come into 
the court, sir. It looked in my win- 
dow. And murdered him. Left 
these stains. And that mark about 
the throat — no human hand could 
have made that.” 

“You aren’t losing your mind, are 
you, John?” There was a little 
sharp, angry edge to the amused 
scorn in Eric Ulnar’s voice. “Any- 
how, it happened while the old 
guards were on duty. I’m going to 
hold them for questioning. You 
will arrest Kalam and Samdu and 
Habibula, and lock them in the old 
cell block under the north tower.” 

“Arrest them? Don’t you think 
that’s rather extreme, sir, before 
they’ve had a chance to speak?” 

“You are presuming on our kin- 
ship, John. Please remember that 
I am still your officer, and in sole 
authority here, since Captain Otan 
is dead.” 

“Yes, sir.” He subdued his haunt- 
ing doubt. Aladoree must be 
wrong ! 

“Here are the keys to the old 
prison.” 

Each of the men John Star was 
ordered to arrest occupied a single 
room that opened upon the court. 
He tapped on the first door, and Jay 
Kalam opened it for him, the rather 
handsome, dark-haired man, whom 
he had seen on the tennis court with 
Aladoree Anthar. 

He was in dressing gown and slip- 
pers. His gravely thoughtful face 
showed weariness; yet he smiled at 
John Star, courteously but silently 
invited him in, motioned him to a 
seat. 

It was the room of a cultured man, 
quietly luxurious, reserved in taste. 



24 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Old-fashioned books. A few select 
pictures. A case of shining labora- 
tory apparatus. An optiphone, now 
filling the room with soft music, its 
stereoscopic vision panel aglow with 
the color and motion of a play. 

Jay Kalam returned to his own 
chair, his attention back on the 
drama. John Star did not like to 
arrest such a man for murder, but 
he took his duty as a legionary very 
seriously. He must obey his officer. 

“I’m sorry ” he began. 

Jay Kalam stopped him with a lit- 
tle gesture. “Please wait. It will 
soon be done.” 

Unable to refuse such a request, 
John Star sat quietly until the act 
was ended, and Jay Kalam turned to 
him with a smile on his grave, 
thoughtful face. 

“Thank you for waiting. A new 
record, that came on the Scorpion. 
I could not resist the temptation to 
see it before I went to bed. But 
what do you wish?” 

“I’m very sorry ” began John 

Star. He paused, stammered. And 
then, seeing that the thing had to 
be done, he went on swiftly: 
“Sorry, but I am ordered by Captain 
Ulnar to place you under arrest.” 

Fine dark eyes met his in quick 
surprise; there was pain in them, as 
if they saw some dreaded thing. 

“May I ask why?” The voice was 
low and courteous. 

“Captain Otan was murdered last 
night.” 

Jay Kalam stood up quickly, but 
did not lose his possession. “Mur- 
dered!” he said quietly after a time. 
“I see. So you are taking me to 
Ulnar?” 

“To the cells. I am sorry.” 

For an instant John Star thought 
the unarmed man was going to at- 
tack him ; he stepped back, hand 
going to his proton gun. But Jay 



Kalam merely smiled a grim little 
smile, said quietly: 

“I shall go with you. A moment, 
to pick up a few articles of cloth- 
ing. The old dungeons are not fa- 
mous for comfort.” 

John Star nodded, kept his hand 
near the needle. 

They crossed the court, descended 
the spiral stair to a hall cut through 
red volcanic rock. With his pocket 
light tube, John Star found the 
corroded metal door, tried it with 
the keys Eric Ulnar had given him, 
failed to open it. 

“I can turn it,” offered his pris- 
oner. 

John Star gave him the key; he 
opened the door after a little effort, 
gravely returned the key, stepped 
through into dank darkness. 

“I’m very sorry about all this,” 
apologized John Star. “An unpleas- 
ant place, I see. But my orders 
were ” 

“Never mind that,” said Jay Ka- 
lam quickly. “But remember one 
thing, please” — his tone was urgent 
— “that you are a soldier of the 
legion.” 

John Star locked the door, went 
after Hal Samdu. 

To his astonishment, the man ap- 
peared in the dress uniform of a 
general of the legion, complete with 
every decoration ever awarded for 
heroism or distinction in service. 
White silk, gold braid, scarlet plume 
— his splendor was blinding. 

“It came on the Scorpion,” Hal . 
Samdu informed him. “Very good, 
don’t you think? Though the shoul- 
ders are not quite ” 

“I’m surprised to see you in a gen- 
eral’s uniform.” 

“Of course,” the man said seri- 
ously, “I don’t wear it in public — 
not yet. I had it made to be ready 
for promotion.” 

“I regret it,” said John Star, “but 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 



25 



I’ve been ordered to place you un- 
der arrest.” 

“To arrest me?” The broad, red 
face showed ludicrous amazement. 
“What for?” 

“Captain Otan has been killed.” 

“The captain — dead?” He stared 
in blank incredulity that changed 
to slow anger. “You think I ” 

His great fists knotted. John Star 
stepped aside, whipped out his pro- 
ton gun. 

“Stop! I’m just obeying orders.” 

“Well ” The big hands opened 

and closed convulsively. He looked 
at the menacing needle, and John 
Star saw simple contempt of danger 
in his eyes. But he stopped. 

“Well ” he repeated. “If it 

isn’t your fault — I’ll go.” 

THE THIRD man, Giles Habi- 
bula, did not open the door when 
John Star knocked, but merely 
called out for him to enter. He was 
the grossly heavy, blue-nosed sen- 
try of the day before, now sitting, 
comfortably unbuttoned, before a 
table covered with dishes and bot- 
tles. 

“Ah, come in, lad, come in!” he 
wheezed again. “I was just eating 
a mortal taste of lunch before I go 
to bed. A blessed hard night we 
had, waiting for trouble in the cold! 

“But draw up and have a bite 
with me. We got new supplies on 
the Scorpion. An agreeable change 
from these mortal synthetic rations ! 
Baked ham, and preserved candied 
yams, and some ripe old Dutch 
cheese — but look it over for your- 
self.” 

He nodded at the table, which, 
John Star thought, bore food enough 
for six hungry men. 

“No, thank you. I’ve come ” 

“If you won’t eat, you will surely 
drink! We’re mortal fortunate here 
in the matter of drink. A wine cel- 



lar left full, when the fort was aban- 
doned in the old days. Aged pre- 
cious well — the best wine, I dare 
say, in the system. A full cellar — 

when I found it. Ah ” 

“I must tell you that I’ve orders 
to place you under arrest.” 

“Arrest? Why, old Giles Habi- 
bula has done no mortal harm to 
anybody. Not here on Mars, any- 
how.” 

“Captain Otan has been murdered. 
You are to be questioned.” 

“You aren’t jesting with poor old 
Giles Habibula?” 

“Of course not!” 

“Murdered!” He shook his head. 
“I told him he should drink with 
me. He lived a Spartan life. Ah, 
it must be terrible to be cut off so! 
But you don’t think I did it, lad?” 
“Not I, surely. But I was ordered 
to lock you in the cells.” 

“Those old dungeons are mortal 
cold and musty!” 

“My orders.” 

“I’ll go with you. Keep your hand 
away from that proton gun. Old 
Giles Habibula wouldn’t make trou- 
ble for anybody.” 

“Come!” 

“May I eat a bite first? And fin- 
ish my wine?” 

John Star somehow liked old 
Giles Habibula, for all his grossness. 
So he sat and watched until the 
dishes were clean and the three bot- 
tles empty — aided, even, in empty- 
ing the latter. And then they went 
together to the dungeons. 

Aladoree Anthar met him as he 
returned to the court, her face shad- 
owed with worry and alarm. 

“John Ulnar,” she greeted, and 
winced at the name, “where are my 
three loyal men?” 

“I have locked Samdu and Kalam 
and Habibula in the old prison.” 

Her face was white with scorn. 
“Do you think they are murderers? 



26 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Eric Ulnar tells me that Captain 
Otan was murdered in his sleep.” 
“No; I don’t think so,” he said 
slowly. “I don’t believe it.” 

“Then why lock them up?” She 
choked with scornful anger. 

“My superior ordered it.” He 
fought to put down his old doubt. 

“Don’t you see what you have 
done? All my loyal guards are 
murdered or imprisoned. I’m at the 
mercy of Ulnar — he’s your mur- 
derer! AKKA is betrayed!” 

“Eric Ulnar a murderer! You 
misjudge ” 

“Come! I’ll show him to you, a 
murderer and a traitor. He has just 
slipped out again. He’s going back 
to the ship that landed last night — 
to his allies!” 

“You’re mistaken. Completely!” 
“Come!” she cried urgently. 
“Don’t be blind to him!” 

She led him swiftly along ramps 
and parapets to the eastern flank of 
the old fortress, up to a tower plat- 
form. 

“Look! The ship — where it came 
from, I don’t understand ! And Eric 
Ulnar, your hero of the legion!” 
Age-worn precipices and red boul- 
der fields fell away from the foot 
of the wall to the lurid plain. There, 
not a mile from them, lay the 
strange ship. 

John Star had seen nothing like 
it. Colossal, overwhelmingly vast. 
Confusingly intricate ; bewilder- 
ingly strange of design. All of a 
glistening, jet-black metal. 

The familiar space craft of the 
system were all spindle-shaped, 
trimly tapering; all of them silvered 
mirrorlike to reduce heat radiation 
and absorption in space; all com- 
paratively small, the largest liners 
not four hundred feet long. 

This machine had a spidery con- 
fusion of projecting parts, beams, 
braced surfaces, vast, winglike 



vanes, massive, jointed metal levers 
about the central part, which was a 
huge globe. And it was incredibly 
gigantic; the metal skids on which 
it rested lay along the red desert 
for a full half mile; the sphere was 
a thousand feet thick. 

“The ship!” whispered the girl. 
“And Eric Ulnar, the traitor!” 

She pointed, and John Star saw 
the man’s tiny figure, scrambling 
down the slope, dwarfed to the 
merest insect in the shadow of that 
gigantic black machine. 

“Now do you believe?” 
“Something is wrong,” he admit- 
ted. “Something I’m going 

after him. I can overtake him, make 
him tell me what’s going on. Even 
if he is my officer.” 

He plunged recklessly down the 
stair from the old tower. 

V. 

THE BLACK mass of the strange 
flyer shadowed the eastern sky, the 
central globe looming like a metal 
moon fallen in the red desert; the 
black skids, lying for half a mile 
upon the debris of boulders they 
had crushed, were like great walls. 
Beneath it, Eric Ulnar was the 
merest atom, shrunken to utter in- 
significance. 

Midway to the machine — almost 
under the tip of a black vane that 
covered an eighth of the sky — he 
still had not looked back. And 
John Star was within forty yards 
of him, breathing so hard he feared 
the man would hear. He gripped 
his proton gun, shouted: 

“Halt! I want to talk to you!” 
Eric Ulnar stopped, looked back 
in astonishment. He made a slight 
movement as if to draw the weapon 
in his own belt, stopped his hand 
before John Star had fired. 

“Come here!” John Star ordered, 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 



27 



and waited, got his breath, while the 
other walked slowly back. 

“Well, John,” he said, with his 
hard, insolent smile, “you are ex- 
ceeding your duty again. I’m afraid 
you’re too zealous to make a suc- 
cessful soldier. My uncle will be 
sorry to hear of your failure.” 

“Eric,” said John Star, in a quiet, 
cold tone — he was surprised a lit- 
tle at his own deadly calm — “I’m 
going to ask you some questions. 
If I don’t like the answers, I shall 
have to kill you.” 

White fury mounted to Eric Ul- 
nar’s weak, passionate face. “John, 
you’ll be court-martialed for this! 
Killed yourself!” 

“Probably I shall. But first I’m 
going to ask you some questions. I 
want to know, to begin with, where 
this ship came from? And why you 
were slipping out here?” 

“How should I know where it’s 
from? Nothing like it has ever been 
seen in the system before. And sim- 
ple curiosity was enough to bring 
me out here. What can you say to 
that, John?” 

The weakly handsome face 
mocked him with a hard smile. 

“I’m afraid, Eric, that you are 
planning treason to the Green Hall,” 
said John Star quietly. “I think 
you understand why this flyer came, 
and why Captain Otan was killed. 
Unless you can convince me that 
I am wrong, I’m going to kill you, 
release the three men I locked up, 
and defend the girl. What have you 
to say?” 

Eric Ulnar looked up at the great 
black vane overshadowing them, 
smiled again, insolently bold. 
“Well, John,” he said deliberately, 
“I am a traitor.” 

“Eric! You admit it?” There 
was both pain and anger in John 
Star’s voice. 

“Of course, John! I’ve never 



planned to be anything else — if you 
call it treason to take what is mine 
by right. I suppose you don’t know 
you have imperial blood in your 
veins, John — your education seems 
to have been neglected. But you 
have. We both have. 

- “I am Emperor of the Sun, John. 
In a very short time I shall be tak- 
ing possession of my throne. As a 
prince of the blood, I had hoped 
that you would be worthy of a high 
place under me. But I doubt, John, 
that you will live to enjoy the re- 
wards of the revolution. You are 
too independent.” 

“Just what have you done?” de- 
manded John Star in a swift, cold 
voice. “And where did this flyer 
come from?” 

He kept his eyes, his menacing 
weapon, fixed on the other. 

“That ship came from the star 
Yarkand, John. You’ve heard, I 
suppose, of the dying men we 
brought back from the expedition? 
Heard of the horrors they babble 
of? They aren’t as insane as men 
think they are, John. Most of the 
horrors they talk about are real. 
And those horrors are going to help 
me crush the Green Hall.” 

“You brought back — allies?” 

Eric Ulnar smiled mockingly at 
the horror in his tone. “Yes, I did, 
John. You see, the things on the 
planet we found — they are as intel- 
ligent as men, though not at all hu- 
man — the things we found need iron. 
It is not found on their world. 
Their science needs it — for mag- 
netic instruments and so forth. So 
I made an alliance with them, John. 

“They were to send this ship, with 
some of their weapons; they have 
fighting machines that would sur- 
prise you, John; their scientific 
achievements are really remarkable. 
They were to send this ship to help 
crush the Green Hall and restore the 



28 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



empire. In return, we were to load 
the ship with iron. 

“Iron is cheap. We may do it. 
But I rather think we’ll wipe them 
out, after we have AKKA and the 
Purple Hall is safely in power 
again. They’re too dangerous to 
have about. Too terrible! Those 

insane men I was near going 

mad, myself ! I’ll destroy them after 
I get the secret weapon. 

“The girl must have told you 
about AKKA, John?” 

“She did! And I thought — I 
trusted you, Eric!” 

“So she suspects ! I’ll have to 
strike fast, to get the chains on her 
before she has a chance to use her 
weapon. But I suppose Vors and 
Kimplen have cared for her by this 
time. They were to watch her.” 

“Yoit — traitor!” whispered John 
Star. 

“Of course, John! We’re taking 
her away. I suppose we’ll have to 
kill her, after she’s told the secret. 
I don’t like to kill such a beauty, 
but with what she knows she’d be 
dangerous to keep around. 

“I’m a traitor, John — by your defi- 
nition. But you’re something worse. 
You are a fool, John. I brought you 
along because I had to have a fourth 
man to complete the guard. And 
because my uncle insisted that you 
be given an opportunity. He seems 
to have an exaggerated idea of your 
ability. 

“You’ve been a fool, John. If you 
want to know, how big a fool, just 
look up above your head.” 

The handsome face smiled mock- 
ingly again. 

John Star had kept his eyes riv- 
eted on the other, expecting some 
ruse to distract him. But Eric Ul- 
nar’s insolent confidence made him 
glance swiftly upward, then; and he 
saw his danger. 

Some fifty feet above him swung 



a sort of gondola, a car of dull red 
metal suspended on cables from a 
great, jointed boom that reached out 
of the flyer’s confusion of titanic 
ebon mechanisms. 

Inside it, he glimpsed — some- 
thing! 

BEYOND THE red sides of the 
gondola John Star could not see 
it clearly. But the little he did see 
made the short hair rise on his neck, 
sent up his spine the cold, electric 
tingle of involuntary horror. 

His breath was checked, his heart 
pounding, his whole body tense and 
quivering. The merest glimpse of 
the thing set off all the danger in- 
stincts of the primitive man in him ; 
the very presence of it roused utter, 
elemental terror. 

Yet in the shadows of the queer 
red car, he could see little enough. 
A bulging, glistening surface, trans- 
lucently greenish, wet, slimy, palpi- 
tating with sluggish life — the body 
surface of something unspeakably 
gross, incredibly vast. 

Fastened malevolently upon him, 
from between shielding plates — an 
eye! Long, ovoid, shining! A well 
of cold purple flame, veiled with an- 
cient wisdom, baleful with impla- 
cable evil. 

The bulging, torpidly heaving 
green surface. The malignant, 
enormous eye. He could see no 
more. But they set off in him every 
instinctive reaction of unreasoning 
primal fear. 

Horror held him for a time, frozen 
in the numb paralysis that stops the 
breath and squeezes the heart; that 
pours choking dust down the throat 
and bathes the rigid limbs with icy 
sweat. He broke free of it at last, 
threw up his weapon. 

But the half-seen, monstrous thing 
struck first. A puff of reddish vapor 
from the side of the swinging gon- 



THE LEGION OF SPACE 



29 



dola. A quick, light blow against 
his shoulder. A red avalanche of 
unendurable pain that hurled him 
back to the sand. The black mercy 
of oblivion. 

When consciousness returned, he 
contrived to sit up, weak, miserably 
sick, his body trembling and wet 
with perspiration, arm and shoulder 
still paralyzed, still aflame with 
scarlet agony. Dizzy, half blinded, 
he looked about. 

Eric Ulnar had vanished, and at 
first he did not see the gondola. But 
the Cyclopean ship still overshad- 
owed him with its strange black 
vanes, and at last he discovered the 
swinging car. 

The titanic boom had reached out, 
over the fort. The car was just ris- 
ing above the red walls when he 
found it. Swiftly the cables were 
drawn in, the mile-long lever 
folded, the gondola vanished into 
the great black globe. 

It had picked up Eric Ulnar, he 
realized, then swung over the fort 
to take aboard Vors and Kimplen, 
with Aladoree. The girl, he real- 
ized, heart utterly sick, was already 
in the colossal machine. 

Very soon, it rose. Cataracts of 
green flame thundered from beneath 
the ebon vanes ; the vanes turned 
into new positions; the ground 
trembled under him as the black 
walls of the skids moved forward 
a little. Very deliberately, the ma- 
chine left the surface, rose obliquely 
across the sky. 



The noise of it beat about him, 
tremendous seas of sound. A fur- 
nace-hot wind whipped up curtains 
of yellow sand, dried the sweat on 
his body. 

It shrank against the dark-blue 
sky, to be a grotesque flying insect; 
the green flame faded, the thunder 
died; it dwindled, grew dim with 
distance, at last was lost. 

John Star lay on the sand, ill, ago- 
nized, helpless. It was late after- 
noon before he rose, still weak and 
faint. Shoulder and upper arm, he 
found, were strangely burned, as if 
some mordant fluid had been 
squirted on them. The skin was 
stiff, lifeless, covered with hard, 
greenish scales. 

The scar was like that on Captain 
Otan’s body. And the eye in the 
gondola — it was like the malignant 
eye that had stared through his win- 
dow! Yes, it was something from 
the ship that had killed the officer. 

Driven by a faint spark of irra- 
tional hope, he staggered back up 
the hill to the old fort, searched the 
inhabited section. It was silent, de- 
serted. Aladoree was really gone, 
with AKKA — the legion and the 
Green Hall had been betrayed. 

He had failed, he realized with a 
sick heart. Ruin lay ahead, punish- 
ment and disgrace. And then he 
forgot himself in anger and pity at 
thought of Aladoree, so freshly 
lovely, in the hands of Eric Ulnar 
and the monstrous things from fear- 
ful Yarkand. 



To be continued next month. 



Follow this great epic. Three musketeers of space set about 
the great adventure on which the fate of the Universe rests. 
You will thrill with them as they meet and conquer strange 

scientific forces. 




Illustrated by Elliot Dold 



his hair bristled, seemed to stand 
on end 



The Green Plague 



by Stanton A. Coblentz 



Science and ambition wreak havoc! 



AS I WRITE these words in my 
A-4 dismal underground lair, by 
X JL the light of a smoking fire 
but little superior to the log blazes 
of the Cave Man, I tell myself that 
it is futile to exert my brain and 
fingers on a record that probably 



none will ever read. For can it be 
possible that some remnants of the 
human race, dwelling in some still- 
undiscovered labyrinth of the earth, 
will make their way to this grotto 
where I drag out my aimless ex- 
istence and find these words along 



THE GREEN PLAGUE 



31 



with the unburied bones of him who 
considers himself perhaps the only 
living man ? 

Yet it is not possible for me to 
keep my hands from carving the 
story upon the cave walls that have 
been my home for these last miser- 
able seven months. How else would 
I be able to save myself from mad- 
ness? How else would I, Caxton 
Brooks, one-time professor of bac- 
teriology at Atlantic University and 
world figure of evil repute, be able 
to save myself from the last extreme 
of insanity at the thought of my 
own guilt in exterminating the hu- 
man race? 

For is it not I that am respon- 
sible? Here, as I crouch in the semi- 
darkness, feeling the flames that be- 
smirch the sandstone galleries, and 
staring into the flickering shadows 
as though afraid to see a ghost, I 
put that question to myself time 
after time — and always the same an- 
swer comes back to taunt me 

“Yes, you poor, blinded fool, you 
are responsible! A thousand times 
over you are responsible for the 
misery that overcame the world; for 
the depopulation of the Green 
Plague, which burst over your race 
like a visitation from Satan ; and 
for the deliverance of your planet 
over to the ants, the beetles, and 
the earthworms, now that all birds 
and mammals are on the road to ex- 
tinction!” 

But let me not continue with 
these aimless ramblings, which show 
only the derangement of my own 
mind. Let me proceed to recount, 
as coherently as I can, that series of 
cataclysmic events which, in this 
good year 2444, has brought the 
world to such a sorry pass. 

But how am I to begin? I should 
have to write the history of the last 
five hundred years in order to ex- 
plain just why I played such a dia- 



bolical part in human affairs. I 
should have to repeat the records of 
wars, wherein populations of hun- 
dreds of millions were wiped out by 
disease germs, machine guns, and 
poison gas; I should have to tell of 
the Anti-Bacteria Disarmament 
Conference, which met in the year 
2334 after every great nation had 
been decimated, and solemnly 
signed a pact outlawing the use of 
gases and microbes in warfare for 
the period of a hundred years. And 
I should have to describe how the 
nations, remembering the tragic 
lessons of the twentieth, twenty- 
first, and twenty-second centuries, 
adhered for the most part of the 
compact, so that we were in a meas- 
ure able to recover from the losses 
of the so-called pestilential ages and 
to regain something of the culture, 
prosperity, and physical well-being 
enjoyed by our forbears more than 
five centuries ago. But I shall pass 
over all this and hasten to tell of 
the crisis of the year 2434 and of 
the part that I had in furthering it. 

But first as to the scientific pre- 
liminaries. 

I SHALL always place the chief 
blame on my propensity toward bio- 
logical investigation. Being in 
charge of the well-equipped bac- 
teriological laboratories of Atlantic 
University, I spared no opportunity 
to investigate the activities of mi- 
croorganisms, which had consti- 
tuted my chief interest ever since 
student days; and I was never so 
happy as when treating some culture 
of bacilli under new conditions of 
environment and growth so as to 
discover their hidden potentialities. 

Fatal failing! Had it not been 
for this propensity to explore the 
unknown, I should never have 
thought of the bacterial sun-stimu- 
lator — and I should not to-day be 



32 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



carving these words upon the rock 
walls of a desolate cavern. 

The principles of the sun-stimu- 
lator are simple enough. It is well 
known that most bacteria, while 
thriving in dark and dank places, 
do not flourish beneath the full rays 
of the sun. Now suppose, said I to 
myself, we were to develop bac- 
teria that could do as well in the 
sunlight as in the dark? Would 
they not manifest a whole series of 
qualities utterly new to science? 
Would they not provide a veritable 
new universe for scientific explora- 
tion? 

So drunk was I with this idea — it 
seems to me now, upon reflection, 
that I must have been mad — that it 
never occurred to me to think of the 
scheme as anything but an alluring 
scientific experiment. Not until 
much later did the evil possibilities 
occur to me. With a zeal that was 
to prove the curse of my life, with 
an eagerness for work for which I 
was to atone more bitterly than for 
any crime, I set out to find the light- 
resisting bacteria. 

The more important events that 
were to follow make it necessary to 
skim over this portion of the story. 
I need only say that it was three 
years before I succeeded, but that, 
long before that time, I had glim- 
merings of how certain insignificant 
bacteria, known in the scientific jar- 
gon of the days as DX Corporeii 
Sanguineii, might be treated with 
ultra-violet emanations so as to de- 
velop a unique sun-resisting ability 
— indeed, might be made to flourish 
and to propagate themselves in an 
atmosphere that would bring instant 
death to the ordinary germ. 

But having made the discovery, 
what was I to do with it? I must 
admit that at first I could not say. 
Many weeks passed while I allowed 
the bacteria to multiply seemingly 



to no purpose; then, all too soon, an 
unlucky chance apprised me of their 
practical usefulness. 

IT HAPPENED one day that a 
new laboratory assistant, Randolph 
Berg by name, divested himself of 
the mask worn as a precaution dur- 
ing bacteriological investigations 
and, before we could warn him, had 
inhaled a whiff of the germ-laden 
air. And by that whiff — poor fel- 
low! — he unwittingly decided his 
own destiny and that of the nations. 

Never shall I forget what fol- 
lowed, thought in later years I have 
grown well-enough inured to scenes 
of horror. Less than an hour later, 
my unfortunate helper was writhing 
in mortal paroxysms. 

His knees had suddenly stiffened 
until, even while he lived, they had 
assumed a deathlike rigor; his 
breath came in short, hard, rasping 
spurts; his eyes had begun to bulge 
out of his face with a mingled ex- 
pression of bewilderment and ag- 
ony; the hair on his head had bris- 
tled and seemed almost ready to 
stand up straight; a blood-stained 
foam had come to his lips; and his 
complexion, boyish rosy only a short 
time before, assumed the strangest 
hue I had ever seen on any human 
face: a pale green, mottled with 
brown, reminding me of hectic 
leaves just taking on their autumn 
coloration. 

Frenziedly my other assistants 
and I, with the aid of a hastily sum- 
moned physician, worked over the 
poor sufferer. But we did not know 
what to do; all our efforts were use- 
less. Long before the second hour 
was over, Berg gave a final groan; 
gazed up at us as if to beseech the 
help which we were powerless to 
offer; then turned over, closed his 
eyes, and, after a convulsive shud- 
der, was still. And all of us stood 

AST— 2 



THE GREEN PLAGUE 



33 



bowed before the first victim of the 
Green Plague. 

But if he was the first, how soon 
the second, the third, and the fourth 
were to follow! Amid the excite- 
ment attendant upon Berg’s col- 
lapse, I alone had the forethought 
to keep my germ-mask in place. 
“What if the disease be conta- 
gious?” I remember wondering, fol- 
lowing my habit of cool, scientific 
analysis even in these most trying 
circumstances. And well for me 
that I asked myself this question. 
The disease was indeed contagious 
— far more so than I had imagined 
possible. 

Never shall I forgive myself for 
not clearly warning my two surviv- 
ing assistants and the physician. I 
did say something to them, I remem- 
ber, but in their agitation they paid 
little heed. No sooner had Berg 
ceased breathing than all three at- 
tendants, one after the other, began 
to manifest the same symptoms; the 
hard, rasping breath, the stiffening 
of the knees, the bulging eyes, the 
bristling hair, the queer, greenish 
skin, mottled with brown. May 
Heaven forgive me for what J had 
unwittingly done to them! Within 
an hour, despite our frantic efforts 
at treatment, all three lay still and 
lifeless. 

HAD I BEEN blessed with any- 
thing approaching elementary rea- 
son, I should now have felt that the 
experiment had proceeded far 
enough. I should have taken the 
sun-resisting germs and extermi- 
nated them ; I should not have rested 
content until the last one had been 
destroyed. 

But, unfortunately, I was not 
made in so wise a mold. It was 
something to know that I had origi- 
nated a bacteriological novelty, even 
though my creation were merely 
AST— 3 



the bearer of a new pestilence; 
hence I could not quite bring myself 
to kill my brain-child. Besides, the 
thought of a possible use for my 
invention leaped to my mind with 
a swiftness that was diabolical. 

The events I have been narrating 
all occurred in the spring of 2434; 
and it was just at this time, as any 
student of history knows, that the 
celebrated Conference of Canton 
was meeting to discuss the renewal 
of the pact of the Anti-Bacteria Dis- 
armament Conference, which was 
now expiring. Few who thought 
about the matter at all had expected 
any difficulty in the reaffirmation of 
so beneficent a compact, which had 
been largely responsible for the ad- 
vances of the past century. 

But the optimists had reckoned 
without the politicians, and without 
the scientists who deal in germs. 
The first, anxious as always to play 
to the grand stand, uttered lurid de- 
nunciations of the dangers of “en- 
tangling alliances,” and, in patent 
disregard of the facts, praised the 
“historic policy of isolation;” while 
the second, anxious for a new outlet 
for their products, uttered a pious 
“Amen!” to the pronouncements of 
the demagogues, and paid for vo- 
luminous advertisements, and not a 
few scientific testimonials, purport- 
ing to show that the most humane 
and cultivated way to slay your en- 
emy was to suffocate him with a 
lethal gas or strike him down with 
disease. 

All these pleas, shallow and in- 
sincere though they were, were ac- 
cepted by the masses at their face 
value. Such, indeed, was the pres- 
sure of an inflamed public opinion 
that two of the leading nations with- 
drew from the conference on 
trumped-up excuses before its ses- 
sions were fairly begun. These na- 
tions — Transeuropia and Upper 



34 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



America — comprised within their 
territories the greater part of the 
North American and of the Euro- 
pean continent; and by their with- 
drawal they not only made the 
further proceedings of the confer- 
ence futile, but resumed an ancient 
antagonism which had more than 
once borne fruit in warfare. 

It was only a few weeks after the 
break-up of the conference that I 
chanced to make my discovery re- 
garding the disease-producing quali- 
ties of DX Corporeii Sanguineii. 
And then it was that, owing to the 
patriotic pride I felt as an Upper 
American, an insidious thought 
came into my mind. Since the next 
war was not far off, and since dis- 
ease germs would undoubtedly play 
a leading part, somewhat as in the 
conflicts of our forbears, why not 
develop the invention for the good 
of my native land? 

Thanks to the swiftness and cer- 
tainty with which it carried death, 
it might prove far more effective 
than the microbes of typhoid, bu- 
bonic plague, yellow fever, or any 
of the better-known afflictions. In 
fact, it might prove the disease germ 
par excellence. 

Here, surely, was a thought to 
conjure with. Not that I did not 
have compunctions; not that it did 
not at times occur to me that it 
would be a terrible thing to mas- 
sacre millions of innocent and de- 
fenseless human beings. But when 
did the pure scientist or the ardent 
nationalist ever have any thought of 
human beings as such? By means 
of a few hasty sophistries, I was able 
to sweep ail opposing arguments 
aside. 

“Why be sentimental? Doesn’t 
the end justify the means?” I rea- 
soned, unconscious that I was but 
repeating the platitudes that had 
misled my forefathers. “The good 



of the greater number, the triumph 
of the nobler cause, must be our 
concern.” 

Oh, how well to-day, as I crouch 
miserably amid the half light of my 
cavern home, do I realize in what 
manner we served the good of the 
greater number, the triumph of the 
nobler cause! 

But ten years ago, unfortunately, 
I was not gifted with prophetic 
vision. Eagerly, and with a feeling 
of patriotic virtue — aud also, let me 
humbly acknowledge, with just the 
bare hope of a monetary award — I 
set about to convert the sun-resist- 
ing bacteria into military weapons. 

This part of the work was in real- 
ity ludicrously simple. All that was 
necessary was to devise a little trans- 
parent vial in which cultures of mil- 
lions of bacteria might be kept for 
moderately long periods of time; 
and then to see that they might be 
distributed so as to work a maxi- 
mum of damage. 

A tool for this purpose was on 
hand in the shape of those little air- 
planes which, manless and propelled 
by radio waves, would bear the 
germs into enemy territory, scatter- 
ing them by the myriad no matter 
what precaution was taken against 
them, scattering them equally well 
if the aircraft were shot down or 
if allowed to fall of their own ac- 
cord and by their impact break the 
vials. 

So few and slight were the prac- 
tical difficulties that in less than a 
month I was prepared to offer the 
bacterial sun-stimulator and the bac- 
teria themselves to the war depart- 
ment of Upper America. 

THE TRANSACTION was rap- 
idly completed. By means of ex- 
periments with guinea pigs, I con- 
vinced the department of the effi- 
cacy of my invention; and shortly 



THE GREEN PLAGUE 



35 



afterward there was a secret sign- 
ing of papers and the passage of a 
sum of money, and I went on my 
way not a little richer for the gift 
which was to bring ruin on my race. 

While the facts never can be 
known positively, there is reason to 
believe that the Transeuropean War 
of 2437-2439 might have been 
avoided had it not been for the sun- 
stimulator. On the basis of private 
information and rumors, I am led 
to suppose that the chemists and 
generals of the war department, hav- 
ing obtained my invention, were a 
little like children with a new toy; 
they were anxious to try out the 
device and see what it could actu- 
ally do. 

But in order to try it out they 
had to have a war, which in any 
case was in line with their profes- 
sional desires; hence they did every- 
thing they could to provoke un- 
friendly relations with their chief 
rival, Transeuropia. 

Owing to the opposition of the 
population, it was three years before 
they could drum up the necessary 
military sentiment; but at last, after 
many parades, reviews, and martial 
demonstrations, accompanied by an 
open competition in armaments, our 
leaders were able to find that we 
had been “insulted” by the action 
of a Transeuropean mob in snatch- 
ing down an Upper American flag 
from the doors of an obscure con- 
sulate in Galicia. 

Since this deed was not satisfac- 
torily explained by the Transeuro- 
pean government, an immediate 
declaration of war followed, and 
millions of Upper Americans rushed 
forth to pour out their lives and 
avenge the honor of the Galician 
consulate. 

Of the course of the war dur- 
ing its first twenty months I shall 
say nothing. Owing to the pres- 



sure of the more timid or more con- 
servative elements, which feared re- 
taliation from Transeuropia, the use 
of DX Coiporeii Sanguineii was 
averted for the better part of two 
years. Only in the twenty-first 
month of the conflict, when millions 
of citizens of both empires had laid 
down their lives and the contest 
seemed likely to end in a deadlock, 
did the advocates of germ warfare 
prevail and the sun-stimulator come 
into effect as an active force. 

I have always believed that had 
the masses of Upper Americans had 
any idea of what was in the minds 
of their leaders, they would have 
risen in mass revolt, outraged at the 
thought of the horror about to be 
perpetrated. But the measures that 
were to destroy them all went for- 
ward quietly, remorselessly, and 
without their knowledge. 

It was in August 2439 that flags 
throughout Upper America waved 
exultantly, and men, women, and 
children everywhere rejoiced at the 
news of a “smashing victory” on the 
Transeuropean front. Ten million 
casualties, it was said, had been in- 
flicted, and as many more were ex- 
pected to follow. 

What the report did not state was 
that the “casualties” had included 
women, old men, babes in arms, 
schoolboys, and schoolgirls — in 

short, the rank and file of the popu- 
lation. What it did not state, also, 
was that the victims had all suc- 
cumbed to a peculiar, excruciating 
disease, which stiffened their knees, 
caused their eyes to bulge out of 
their faces, and their hair to bris- 
tle, and turned their skins a mottled 
green. 

But before long, despite the 
strictest efforts of the censorship 
bureau, something of the truth be- 
gan to leak out. Ghastly in the ex- 
treme were the reports unofficially 



36 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



bruited abroad. It was said that 
throughout vast districts of Trans- 
europia not a living creature was 
to be seen; not a plowman in the 
fields, not a bird in the air, not a 
horse, a cow, or a sheep in the de- 
serted pasture lands. 

In the great cities of Parlin and 
Berscow, it was rumored, there was 
not so much as one loiterer on thor- 
oughfares formerly thronged, but 
the unburied corpses lay in heaps, 
and the odor of pestilence polluted 
the air. Only in a few remote coun- 
try districts was any life at all 
known to survive. 

In such conditions, the war of 
course v/as over. Upper America 
had won; and not even a formal 
proclamation of peace was neces- 
sary. Great, therefore, was the 
chorus of rejoicing at our triumph; 
intense was the jubilation which 
drowned out the shocked protests; 
vast was the acclaim and prolonged 
the celebration at Upper America’s 
reestablished supremacy among the 
nations. 

But even while the bugles blared 
and the victorious troops paraded, 
the discerning could have read the 
signals of doom. 

IT V/AS AT about the time of 
the withdrawal of our armies from 
Transeuropia that the cry “Green 
Plague! Green Plague!” began to 
echo throughout the world. If the 
truth be known, some of our own 
soldiers had been afflicted, succumb- 
ing to a contagion that spread like a 
whirlwind and recognized no boun- 
daries of nation or race. In the war- 
fare waged by the disease demon 
there could be neither neutrality nor 
truce. 

Carried by fugitives, and trans- 
mitted over air and water by planes 
and ships, the new bacteria grew and 
multiplied with incalculable rapid- 



ity. In countries that had held aloof 
from the Transeuropean War, the 
scourge raged no less than on the 
former battlefields ; not a month had 
passed before the people of every 
land were fighting for their very ex- 
istence with the invisible foe. 
Short-lived indeed had been our vic- 
tory! 

Now ensued the four, so-called 
desolate years. It will be believed 
that every effort was made to fight 
off the Green Plague; that scientists 
in their laboratories experimented 
ceaselessly to find means to combat 
it; that private citizens were cau- 
tioned in every way and urged to 
wear germ-proof masks whenever 
possible. 

But all efforts proved unavailing. 
No way — absolutely none — was 
found to. check the inroads of the 
destroyer, which, gaining some un- 
accountable potency from the sun- 
light which it absorbed, attacked and 
poisoned the blood stream and 
brought inevitable death within an 
hour or two. 

Imagine the agony and terror in 
which we lived! The germs lurked 
all about us, in the air we breathed, 
sometimes in the very food we ate 
— and to avoid them continually was 
impossible, since no one could wear 
a mask when eating. 

Besides, no one wanted to wear a 
mask ; the very will to live had been 
obliterated. To exist in constant 
fear and horror was to exist in a 
state v/orse than death. 

On all sides, one saw one’s friends 
and relatives perishing from the 
malady or from starvation. One 
found cities already growing de- 
serted, and the weeds springing up 
between their neglected pavement 
stones. One heard the constant wail- 
ing of the mourners and the brawl- 
ing of men who, once prosperous, 



THE GREEN PLAGUE 



37 



would fight with a stray dog for a 
crust. 

One knew how, in the country, 
the cattle were falling in their tracks 
from the same irresistible pesti- 
lence, and how the very beasts and 
birds of the woods were stricken, 
while farmers, anticipating their 
own early end, had no longer the 
ambition to till their fields. 

One realized, finally, that no more 
babies were being born; for who, 
amid the barrenness of these tor- 
mented years, would dare to bring 
new life into the world? Hence the 
human race seemed headed straight 
for extinction. 

One ray of hope — and that a very 
dim one — did come to us like the 
straw clutched by the drowning 
man. Though the germ had proved 
unconquerable in the sunlight, what 
of the darkness? Like other bac- 
teria, unfortunately, it was not 
killed by the absence of light; but, 
on the other hand, its potency was 
greatly reduced. Therefore our last 
refuge appeared to be in subter- 
ranean galleries and caves. We were 
being driven like rats into the bow- 
els of the earth! 

Toward the end of the desolate 
years, accordingly, the straggling 
remnants of our race began fran- 
tically to burrow underground. 
What miserable specimens of men 
they were! Pale and emaciated, 
their clothes in rags, their hair and 
beards unkempt, their eyes wild 
with a hunted expression, they 
slunk like whipped dogs into base- 
ments, into tunnels and subways and 
pits and caverns; and there, if they 
escaped the peril of the Green 
Plague, they fell victims to diseases 
bred of the darkness, or to sheer ter- 
ror, madness, or famine. 



As long as I was able, I fought 
off the craving to seek refuge un- 
derground. But at length the upper 
world had become too dreary to be 
endured. Utter depopulation had 
set in; wherever I went, in the grass- 
grown streets of cities or on once- 
frequented country roads, I saw not 
a single living thing. Was it that 
I, who had precipitated the calam- 
ity, was to face the doom of being 
the last survivor? 

Finally, in a panic, I wandered 
out among the mountains and found 
this cave, where for seven months I 
have subsisted on roots and fungi 
and the fish of a subterranean lake, 
while never venturing up into the 
open except by night. And now, 
suffering from the agues of this 
dank place and feeling my end to be 
approaching, I keep my mind occu- 
pied by inscribing this record on the 
cave walls, in the hope that it will 
yet be read by eyes other than my 
own. 

For, in the face of reason, the 
thought persists that somewhere on 
the earth — in some desert or island 
or remote tropical wilderness — 
there may survive some men so iso- 
lated as to have escaped the Green 
Plague ; and I console myself by 
thinking that these men will found 
a new race, which will spread out 
and cover the erath, and one day 
they will find this cavern and de- 
cipher these words and will take 
warning from the tale of our down- 
fall, lest they, too, rear majestic 
domes and towers, only to succumb 
in the end to an invisible germ of 
their own brewing. 

So closes the story of the 
wretched being who, for all he can 
say, may be the last man. 



A Matter of Size 

The Novelette by HARRY BATES 




mmm 

iPM 






r~|~l HOUGH his head was as 
| stuffed with cotton, the de- 
-8- tails of the scene in his New 
York laboratory that night came 
back with insistent clearness. It was 
long past the turn of the clock, and 
he had been working for hours on a 
monograph on the Mutrantian Ti- 
tans, which would establish indubi- 
tably the biological brotherhood of 
those colossi of Saturn’s Satellite 
Three with the genus Homo of 
Earth. He was deeply immersed, 
and the muted night murmurs of 



the great city around and below 
washed unheeded through his ears. 

Then something, perhaps a slight 
motion, an extraneous noise, caused 
him to look up — and there, within 
the lamplight on the far side of his 
desk, stood the most amazing figure 
of a man that he, ethnologist though 
he was, had ever seen. 

His visitor wore sandals and a 
loose-fitting blue robe. He stood all 
at ease, a slight, enigmatic smile on 
his face. 

That man ! He could see him now. 





Illustrated by M. Marchioni 



He punched three buttons- 






as clear in every point as if he were 
present. 

The head was massive, the 
cranium oval, and not one hair 
adorned its smooth and shining sur- 
face. Beneath the deep corruga- 
tions of the forehead the face sloped 
gently backward past a snub nose as 
far as the mouth, where it fell 
sharply away, leaving but the merest 
excuse of chin and lower jaw. The 
neck was long, the shoulders slop- 
ing; the whole apparition was gro- 
tesque. But he was not tempted to 
smile. No one could have looked 



into that man’s face and smiled. The 
eyes, large, light, and piercing, 
would have prevented that. 

“You are Doctor Arthur Allison,” 
the man had said. “I’ve come a long 
way to see you.” 

“You’re certainly not from 
Earth?” Allison said, gaping, stat- 
ing the fact rather than asking it. 

“No.” 

“Then” — he could not restrain the 
question — “then, for Heaven’s sake 
tell me, are you sport or typical?” 

The other smiled. “Always the 
scientist, I see! I am typical.” 



40 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Allison rose in amazement and 
went around the side of the desk. 
“But — but that can hardly be!” he 
exclaimed. “The solar system’s been 
pretty thoroughly explored, and no 
race such as yours has ever been dis- 
covered.” 

The stranger’s smile faded. “That 
discovery has been reserved for 
you,” he said significantly. He 
paused. “May I come to the point 
of my visit?” 

“Please do. I — I’m tremendously 
interested. Will you sit down?” 

“Thank you — no. There is not 
much time.” 

He locked the ethnologist with 
his eyes. 

“I am the emissary of a people un- 
known to you,” he began. “Our 
abode lies within the solar system a 
reasonable distance away, and for 
sufficient reasons no uninvited man 
of your race has ever laid question- 
ing eyes on it, and no man of your 
generation but you ever will. Our 
racial strain is cousin to yours, but 
our science and civilization are 
ahead by more than 40,000 years. 
Our powers exceed what might be 
your wildest imaginings. In terms of 
death, for instance, we could, in 
fourteen days, destroy every trace 
of crustal life on Earth and all her 
tributary planets; or we could, in 
that same space of time, reduce 
every single vertebrate to a state of 
impotent slavery. 

“We would never do these things, 
however. We have neither the need 
nor the desire ; we are not inhumane 
and not, of course, so stupid. Our 
self-determined developmental cycle 
will not bring us into intimate con- 
tact with you Earthmen for tens of 
thousands of years, and meanwhile 
we will remain as we are, aloof and 
inaccessible, happy within reason 
and practically self-sufficient. 

“You note that I say ‘practically.’ 



Once in every twenty-five years we 
invite one carefully chosen Earth- 
man to do us a service. You, without 
knowing it, have ever since your 
graduation from college been our 
most promising candidate. We have 
had you under observation for seven 
years, have investigated your an- 
cestors back for ten generations, and 
in heredity, manhood, intellect, and 
achievement you are all that we ask ; 
so it is to you, alone of your genera- 
tion, that I come now to offer this 
highest honor that could fall to a 
man of your time. 

“I may not tell you what your 
service to us will be. You must 
trust me implicitly, obey me blindly. 
You will come to no danger or hurt. 
You must leave with me immedi- 
ately, for a destination and by a 
route that will be kept secret from 
you. You will be gone four months. 
Those four months will be the high 
point of your intellectual, scientific, 
and, I might add, emotional life. 
Are you ready?” 

“You make an extraordinary re- 
quest!” the ethnologist said, when 
he found words. 

“Ours is an extraordinary race,” 
was the instant answer. 

“If I refuse?” 

“I could use force, and you’d be 
just as valuable to us under coercion 
as without; but I won’t. You will 
not refuse. Not one of the men that 
has ever been approached has re- 
fused.” 

“Has this ‘service’ anything to do 
with my specialty?” 

The man’s eyes showed the faint- 
est trace of amusement. “I may say 
yes,” he replied. “It is applied and 
very, very practical ethnology.” 

“I shall be returned here without 
hindrance when this service is 
done?” 

“Of course; and you may bring 
back with you all the knowledge of 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



41 



our science that you can absorb and 
retain.” 

Allison considered a moment. He 
asked: “May I see your feet?” 

The out-worlder smiled. He sat 
on a chair and removed one sandal, 
exposing a foot such as no man on 
Earth had ever yet possessed. The 
big toe was very large, and was 
flanked by another only a little bit 
smaller. The three outer toes were 
vestigial. Here was the foot of the 
human race, thousand of years in the 
future. 

Allison’s eyes bulged. The knowl- 
edge there would be! 

As if reading his mind the stran- 
ger said: “Your Mr. Wells said it 
long ago. ‘Think of the new knowl- 
edge!”’ 

The words were a light in Alli- 
son’s brain. He turned away. The 
stranger replaced the sandal and 
rose. 

“Think of the new knowledge!” 
he repeated. 

The ethnologist turned to him. 
“What is your name?” he said. 

The other smiled. “I am some- 
times called Jones,” he replied. 

And they were the last words that 
had been spoken. Allison remem- 
bered that he, too, had smiled; that 
he had spontaneously held out his 
hand in tacit acceptance; that as his 
palm touched the out-worlder’s 
there had been a sharp sting as of 
a needle; and then all his senses 
had left him, and he sank down and 
down into oblivion. 

FOR ONE and a half Earth hours 
Allison lay loggy on the immaculate 
white cot, only the changing expres- 
sion of his opened eyes telling of 
the chaos within. Then slowly and 
by insensible degrees his delirium 
became more physical, and he 
strained at the broad cloth bands 
that held him down, tossed within 



their narrow confines, muttered gib- 
berish in three languages. 

A thousand horrific menaces dis- 
puted his long way up to conscious- 
ness, each a nightmare shape 
spawned out of unknown frustra- 
tions in the abysmal unconscious. 
By twos and by threes he battled 
them — all the long dark arms, the 
fire eyes, the scale-skinned, and the 
amorphous, and those worse ones 
without name or substance which 
enveloped him with intangible op- 
pression. It was most unfair, for no 
combat was ever decisive; always 
the shapes eluded him; and indeed 
they changed their identity as he 
faced them and were never twice the 
same. 

Except three. Three there were 
that remained a little apart, but 
which came again and again and 
were always clear and undisorted. 
First was the out-wordly stranger. 
Then the blue-eyed girl. And last 
the interminable rows of doll faces, 
each a likeness of his own ; each one 
himself. 

As the hours passed and he fought 
upward it became increasingly nec- 
essary to identify these recurring 
images. They were somehow enor- 
mously important. They were bound 
with his life, or had been, or would 
be; it was very obscure, which; and 
they were all a mystery and a men- 
ace in their own fashion. 

To trap their secret he constructed 
colossal edifices of metaphysical 
cunning, performed prodigies of de- 
duction, all the while he swam 
oceans, plunged through fire, sank 
through bottomless ooze in his run- 
ning fight with the demons that be- 
set him; but always at the moment 
of knowing he would forget what 
he was looking for and have to begin 
all over. 

Who was the out-worldly stran- 
ger? Who, the blue-eyed girl? 



42 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Those rows of doll faces — why were 
they his faces? Why was each one 
himself ? 

He would try new cunning. He 
would close his eyes for a long 
while, then open them suddenly, and 
he’d know. 

The man on the immaculate white 
cot closed his eyes and lay still ; and 
then began the long, deep sleep that 
was to restore him to himself. 

ALLISON awoke gently and lay 
quiet a moment, dully wondering 
where he might be and how he had 
arrived there. The room was un- 
familiar, with its close, square walls 
and the peculiar but soothing soft 
amber haze that filtered evenly from 
horizontal tubes set well up near the 
ceiling. There was no trace of a 
window, but a metal-framed door 
showed indistinctly in the wall at 
his right. He turned toward it — and 
found himself restrained. 

A surge of alarm ran through his 
veins and brought him fully awake. 
He arched upward and discovered 
that a broad cloth band had been 
passed over his chest and another 
over his thighs. His arms were free, 
and his exploring hands soon found 
a buckle which was easily loosened. 
He sat up and released his legs, then 
was at once out of bed and making 
for the door. 

He found it locked. 

“Not so good,” he thought, push- 
ing back his shock of yellow hair 
and turning and surveying the room. 
But at the head of the bed was a 
small table — the only other article 
of furniture. Placed opposite under 
the ceiling were grilles which he de- 
cided were for ventilation. The 
walls looked like marble? cream-col- 
ored, and apparently synthetic. 

He turned back to the door ; 
pounded on it; yelled out: “Hey, 
Jones”; listened. He couldn’t be 



sure, but he thought he heard a faint 
answering noise outside. He re- 
peated his call; but no one came, 
and, irritated, he went back to the 
cot and sat on its edge, head in 
hands, until “Jones” should come 
and release him. 

It was clear he had been anaesthe- 
tized, and he supposed he couldn’t 
complain, for it had been part of 
their agreement that both route and 
destination be kept secret; but how 
deucedly prompt the man had acted ! 

And how long he must have been 
unconscious ! A quarter-inch growth 
of beard scratched the palms held 
to his cheeks! Well, no doubt he 
had arrived. 

The ethnologist rose from the cot 
and stalked about the room. He was 
not overcongratulating himself for 
the sheeplike docility with which he 
had acceded to the out-worlder’s 
amazing offer. There were a hun- 
dred questions to ask, and hardly 
one had been answered; there were 
affairs of importance to be put in 
order before leaving Earth, and not 
one had been attended to. Confound 
Jones, for the outrageous prompt- 
ness of his action! Where was he 
now, anyway? 

Again he banged on the door and 
yelled, and again it was fruitless. 
He resumed his pacing. 

“Jones!” Of all names for the out- 
worlder to go by ! Practical, though, 
of course. His real name was proba- 
bly Ugkthgubx, or some such jaw 
breaker. Would match his face 

The Earthman stopped short. 
Into his stream of consciousness had 
floated a figment that would not 1/2 
identified. Something about a girl, 
blue-eyed and beautiful. And some- 
thing else — connected with her — 
rows and rows — frightening— him- 
self there, somehow- 

It sank and was gone. 

He sat again on the cot, tense. 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



43 



“open,” delicately fishing it back up. 
It came — went — came clearly. 

Interminable rows of doll faces 

But why were they his faces? 

Why was each one himself? 

A thrill of fear swept up his back. 
Had something been done to him 
while he was unconscious? 

Later : Why the emotion, why the 
fear that accompanied that memory? 

Still later : Why that flash that 
something may have been done to 
me while I was unconscious? 

He hung suspended, fishing for 
answers that would not come. Grad- 
ually the image faded, leaving in its 
place an intangible feeling of op- 
pression. He got up and walked to 
throw off the spell; muttered: 

“God help Jones if he did monkey 
with me!” 

There was a noise at the door, 
and, turning, he beheld the massive 
bald head that never could he forget. 
Smiling, Jones entered. 

“You are recovered?” he asked 
cordially. 

An exclamation of anger rose to 
Allison’s lips — and died there. Be- 
hind the out-worlder stood a girl. 
She was clad in a simple, loose- 
flowing crimson robe, gathered at 
the waist. She was blue-eyed and 
beautiful. 

Jones beckoned to her. “Doctor 
Allison,” he said, “let me present 
our Miss CB-301.” 

II. 

ALLISON did not distinguish him- 
self for ease of manner in that in- 
troduction, for he was wondering 
how it could be that this girl, whom 
he was now meeting for the first 
time, could be the very one whose 
image already dimly lurked in his 
memory. None of his awkwardness 
was to be charged to any romantic 
“falling for” her; no mistake is to 



be made about that. A score of girls 
had hitherto found he was quite im- 
mune — though a psychoanalyst 
might have discovered that what he 
called “a scientific disinterest in the 
sex” could be reduced to the absurd 
fact that he was simply a little 
afraid of them. 

The ethnologist, becoming aware 
that Miss So-and-So had said “How 
do you do !” in the most conventional 
of Earth fashions, in turn nodded 
and mumbled something himself. 
Jones smiled broadly and, stepping 
to the door, begged to be excused, 
saying he was overwhelmed with 
work. 

“Miss CB-301 speaks your lan- 
guage perfectly,” he said, “and will 
explain such things as are per- 
mitted. I’ll be back presently.” 
And the door clicked closed behind 
him, leaving an off-balanced young 
ethnologist very much alone with an 
unabashed young maiden with freck- 
les on her nose and the light of ad- 
miration in her eyes. 

Allison stood stiffly uncomfortable. 
Who could have thought that this 
would happen? And so suddenly? 
Confound that Jones again; he was 
certainly one fast worker. 

What should he say to the fe- 
male? Nice day? No — better, flat- 
tery. He complimented her on the 
lack of accent in her speech. It 
suggested unusual brains in one so 
young. 

“Oh, but no — I’m really terribly 
dumb!” the young thing gushed sin- 
cerely. “I could hardly get through 
my fourth-dimensional geometry ! 
But English is easier. Don’t you 
think so?” 

Yes; he certainly thought so. He 
warmed toward her a little. “Then 
let me congratulate you,” he said, 
“for admitting your dumbness. I’m 
not accustomed to such extraordi- 
nary modesty on the part of women. 



44 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



I may say I find it very becoming.” 

The girl smiled her delight, and 
Allison smiled, too. Then, struck 
by an unpleasant thought, her face 
took on a woebegone look. 

“I’m an atavism,” she said. 

What was the polite comment on 
that? 

The ethnologist in Allison rose to 
the surface. “Let me see your feet,” 
he said with sudden eagerness. 

“Oh, no — don’t ask that! Please!” 

She shrunk from him. 

“Why not?” he demanded. 

“Because they’re so ugly!” the girl 
exclaimed wretchedly. “I don’t 
want you to see them! Ever!” 

“Sit down and take off your san- 
dals!” he ordered. After all, she 
was only a kid, and her reluctance 
was unwarranted and foolish. 

Tremblingly the girl obeyed, and 
Allison looked down upon as beau- 
tiful a pair of five-toed feet as he 
had ever seen. Extremely interest- 
ing, so complete a divergence from 
what must be the present racial type. 
He smiled, and she, seeing, felt bet- 
ter and hastened to put her sandals 
on again. 

“After all,” she said rising, “even 
though I am an atavism, you’re a 
primitive, and — and — well, it could 
be terribly thrilling!” 

She looked up at him adoringly — 
hopefully. 

Allison laughed. He was all at 
his ease now with the young thing, 
and, it must be repeated, he was 
thoroughly immune. 

“It sounds as if you’re proposing,” 
he said. 

“We’re to be married,” she con- 
fided. “I hope you don’t mind too 
much.” 

This was ominous and led to a 
sudden terrible suspicion. 

“Is this why I was brought from 
Earth — to marry you?” he demanded 
angrily. 



“Oh, no! Not just for me!” she 
answered; then, as if conscious of 
having made a slip, she added 
quickly: “I saw you when they 
brought you in and asked then. You 
see, you’re the only man I’ve ever 
met who is like me. I never felt 
funny about any one else the way I 
feel funny about you.” 

He was reassured, but it left the 
problem of rebuffing her. He had 
done nothing to commit himself, 
and it was just her hard luck if she 
had to go and “feel funny” where 
one so hopeless as he was concerned. 
He had better nip her romantic no- 
tions in the bud. 

“Young lady, I like you very 
much,” he said, “but my interest is 
largely ethnological. I’m sorry, 
but it can never be anything more. 
I — I’ll be a — a big brother to you,” 
he concluded asininely. 

The girl was hurt, and her face 
fell. It was very awkward for a mo- 
ment. Allison affected a cheeriness 
he did not feel. 

“Come,” he said, “tell me about 
your people. Do they all look like 
the man who brought me here? Are 
you the only one of your kind in 
the whole country?” 

She brightened a little. “Yes,” 
she replied; “I’m the only one like 
you. You wouldn’t care for the oth- 
ers at all. Look — I’ll show you.” 

She lifted her left wrist and 
showed him, strapped thereto, what 
looked like an enameled wrist watch 
wih a large bezel; only the dial of 
this was blank, and radiating from 
the sides were five gnurled stems. 

“Do you have these on Earth?” 
she asked. He admitted they did 
not. “Look,” she said, turning her 
body at an angle and adjusting the 
stems. 

AS ALLISON looked, close by 
her side, the dial took on an opales- 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



45 



cent glow, and dimly there appeared 
on it threads and shadows which 
under her adjustments cleared into 
a picture, animated — the heads and 
figures of half a dozen women. 

“Television,” he said. “You’re re- 
ceiving this from a broadcasting 
studio.” 

“No,” she corrected; “a search- 
beam, portable. I can focus it at a 
distance on whatever I choose. It 
passes through almost anything.” 
Allison marveled. “But that’s not 
the point,” she objected; “look at 
those women. Do you find them 
more beautiful than I?” 

He certainly did not. They were, 
each one, the feminine counterpart 
of the man Jones. Their necks were 
as columnar, their shoulders as 
sloped, and their heads were noth- 
ing less than disgusting, considering 
that they belonged to bodies of what 
is commonly called the “fair sex.” 
They had wide faces, flat, with bulg- 
ing foreheads and utterly degen- 
erated jaws, with a rim of thin hair 
that circled their craniums as might 
a fringed girdle, an egg. 

Allison shuddered. “I pass!” he 
said. 

The girl probably did not under- 
stand his words, but she read aright 
the expression on his face. “You 
see!” she cried triumphantly, as if 
it were thereby decided that he was 
to marry her. “That is part of the 
line of waiting brides to be. You’ve 
got to marry one of us!” 

“Well, I’m not going to marry one 
of you!” the ethnologist exclaimed 
angrily. “Why do you say I do?” 
he demanded, the ominous suspicion 
again taking shape in his mind. 
“Why? Why?” he repeated, follow- 
ing her as she backed away. 

The girl was on the verge of 
tears. “I can’t tell you, and I 
won’t!” she said. “But it’s a shame, 
’cause I thought it would be so easy 



and nice! Because you’re a primi- 
tive.” 

Allison turned away ; there was no 
satisfaction to be had from her. 
She was a throwback, all right. He 
suddenly wanted very much to see 
the man called Jones. He had plenty 
of explanations coming to him, and 
it seemed to him he’d been treated 
rather shabbily so far. He turned 
back to the girl. 

“Miss — Miss ” He came to a 

stop. “Pardon me — what is your 
name again?” 

“Miss CB-301.” 

“Ah, yes. May I call you Miss 
Brown? Uh — Miss Brown, will you 
go find Mr. Jones — the man who in- 
troduced us? I want to see him at 
once. 

“Or maybe I can go to him?” he 
quickly suggested. 

“Oh, no, you can’t do that. I’ll 
go bring him here.” She seemed a 
little afraid of her primitive. She 
added, more brightly; “I think I 
want to see him myself.” 

“Will you lend me that search- 
beam till you get back?” 

She hesitated, as if she should not, 
then, pathetically eager to please 
him, she unstrapped and placed it 
about his left wrist. She’s beautiful, 
all right, he thought, as she fastened 
it on. Hair, and plenty of it. Thick 
and dark and tastefully drawn 
through that jeweled clasp at the 
nape of her neck. Those other 
women’s ! 

She tapped on the door, and it 
was opened by a brown-robed figure 
outside. For a moment she looked 
softly into Allison’s eyes, and then 
she was gone. 

What had she meant by saying he 
had to marry “one of us”? Had to! 
Yes; Jones had plenty of explana- 
tions piling up. 

The ethnologist sat on the edge 
of the cot and held up his wrist. 



46 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



What a marvel of ingenuity the lit- 
tle device was! Tentatively he 
turned the stem she had first 
touched. The dial glowed, then 
meaningless shadows appeared on it. 
The slightest movement of his body 
changed these shadows for new ones. 
He turned other stems and got what 
seemed to be a wall. Delicately he 
manipulated in the attempt to probe 
beyond. The blurred figure of a 
man appeared, came cleared, and 
then Allison got a shock. The image 
that lay on the glowing round dial 
was point for point his own. 

In his amazement he moved, and 
the man was gone. Pulse throbbing, 
he fished him back. No doubt about 
it— the outlines were fuzzy, but the 
resemblance was there. All over — 
size, shoulders, head, proportions, 
clothing. Even the room he occu- 
pied was identical. He stood lean- 
ing against the wall, arms folded, 
looking in angry fashion straight 
ahead, and on his face was a short 
thatch of yellow beard. 

Out of Allison’s unconscious came 
the memory he had had before. In- 
terminable rows of doll faces. Each 
face his own face, and each one, 
somehow, himself. 

Mystery lay all around him. 
Jones, so strangely in out of the 
night. His extraordinary offer. The 
sudden unconscious journey. The 
unknown out-world civilization that 
hemmed him in. The rows of doll 
faces with their freight of fear. 
This man who looked so like him- 
self. What devil’s work could be 
under way? 

There was movement on the glow- 
ing dial. The door of the room 
opened, and the man known as Jones 
entered, followed by a surgeonlike 
figure in white smock and helmet 
who pushed before him a rubber- 
wheeled table. At sight of them the 
man left the wall and advanced men- 



acingly. They talked, and Jones’ 
manner was wholly conciliatory. 

Then, suddenly, it was over. 
Jones stepped to the man’s side and 
touched him lightly on the shoulder 
with the palm of his hand. He 
slumped to the floor, from which in 
businesslike fashion he was picked 
up, laid on the table and wheeled 
out through the door. 

Allison stared with amazement. It 
was the same trick that had been 
worked on him. The shoulder in- 
stead of the hand. 

The men were gone from the dial. 
He set himself quickly to picking 
them up again. Angling his body 
slightly did it. They had paused 
outside the door. 

They moved; grew blurred; he 
found a stem that brought them 
sharper again. He followed them 
down a square corridor into which 
many doors were set at equal dis- 
tances on each side. As they pro- 
gressed they dwindled to the size of 
match heads, but he found the way 
to make them larger. Other figures 
passed by, two in white smocks and 
helmets, others in colored gowns, 
their ugly heads fully exposed ; and 
as Allison looked at them, his group 
was gone. 

An anxious moment, then he 
found them. They were a little 
lower to one side, descending in an 
elevator. Lost them! Again his 
heart stood still while he felt them 
out. It was as if that unconscious 
man on the table— that man who so 
resembled him — -were he himself. 
Where were they taking him? 
What was to be done v/ith him, all 
unresisting? 

There passed an interval during 
which a jumble of walls, shadows, 
people, strange apparatus, and blurs 
were all that came to his dial. Once, 
even, a conical green bush; or per- 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



47 



haps it was a tree. Then Allison by 
pure chance found his men again. 

An imposing picture lay on the 
dial when he had brought them to 
size and clarity. They stood wait- 
ing behind a low railing at one end 
of a large auditorium. Behind them, 
the other side of the railing, half a 
hundred rows of seats, laced by 
aisles, rose upward to the ceiling, 
and every seat was occupied by men 
and women of the strange race 
whose prisoner he was. In front of 
them, the focal point of every eye 
in that vast gathering, was a glit- 
tering cage, within which rested two 
chairs, meshed by wires together, 
and placed in front of a complicated 
battery of scientific apparatus whose 
nature Allison didn’t know. 

QUICKLY, with perfect coordi- 
nation, the ensuing scene took place. 
The tatile bearing the unconscious 
man was wheeled within the cage, 
and he was removed and made to 
sit upright in one of the chairs. At 
the same time a woman of the race, 
escorted by an official, entered the 
space within the railing from a door- 
way to the right and was conducted 
to the other chair. She was touched, 
palm on shoulder, by Jones, and im- 
mediately slumped back uncon- 
scious. Metallic headbands attached 
to the chairs were fastened about 
their foreheads. Then all left the 
cage and the door was closed. 

Jones went to a large panel to one 
side and threw a switch, and for one 
instant a glow of varicolored light 
flooded the cage. When it had died 
he and the others reentered, freed 
the two subjects, and, in a way Alli- 
son could not catch, revived them. 
Then the handsome young man with 
the blond hair and the ugly woman 
with the fringed bald head and cor- 
rugated brow proceeded out of the 
cage to a small desk by the railing, 



where they stopped, looked deeply 
at each other, and in full view of the 
assembled thousands kissed each 
other ardently on the mouth. 

Idols of Pluto! Allison was flab- 
bergasted, but, more than that, he 
was nauseated. For that blond 
young man who so disturbingly re- 
sembled him was subtly, somehow, 
himself. He, too, felt he had kissed 
that woman. 

For a moment he could not look, 
and when he did he found the actors 
gone. The audience, however, re- 
mained, and most of them were smil- 
ing. What could it all mean? 

The ethnologist let his wrist fall, 
brushed his forehead, tried to con- 
sider. Should he confront Jones 
with this new knowledge when he 
saw him? If he were slated to fig- 
ure in such proceedings himself, it 
would surely be as scientist rather 
than subject. And just as surely, 
in spite of his subconscious feeling 
of oppression, the man he had been 
following could have no relation to 
him. 

Speaking out to Jones would get 
the girl in trouble. 

As he was thinking, the man him- 
self entered in his quick and quiet 
way. Allison rose, with care keep- 
ing his left wrist to his side. 

“Doctor Allison,” the out-worlder 
said without preamble, “may I ask 
if you feel any — uh — sentimental in- 
clination toward the young lady I 
introduced you to?” 

“It happens I do not,” the eth- 
nologist answered sharply. The 
question irritated him. “May I in 
turn ask when I’m to be allowed to 
leave this room?” he asked. 

The other made an appealing ges- 
ture. “Please,” he said, “you’ve only 
just regained consciousness.” He 
made a promise. “I’ll see to it that 
you leave within fifteen minutes.” 

“It would seem that my arrival is 



43 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



of not quite the importance you led 
me to anticipate,” Allison said with 
bitterness. 

The out-wcrlder smiled inscruta- 
bly. “On the contrary,” he objected, 
“it is. You’ve caused a tremendous 
excitement. Thousands are now 
busy with the preparations to re- 
ceive you.” 

Was he alluding to anything in 
connection with the scene in the 
auditorium? How could he sound 
him without betraying the girl? 
There seemed no way. 

“Exactly what is the nature of 
this service you’ve asked me to ren- 
der?” he asked at last. 

The other was at the door. “I’ll 
tell you when I come back,” Jones 
promised. “But I might say, for 
the time being, that it is of vital im- 
portance to the fecundity of our 
race.” 

And with these cryptic words, be- 
fore Allison could recover, Jones 
was gone. 

III. 

SITTING on the cot, Allison 
tried to bring to order his scattered 
thoughts. He felt his position grew 
moment by moment more dangerous, 
but why, it was difficult to discover. 
Jones had as yet made no overt act, 
nor had he done anything that might 
be construed as contrary to their 
agreement. The fellow was not very 
likable, but then he was an out- 
worlder, of unpleasant face and fig- 
ure, and Allison well knew how 
wrong superficial estimates of such 
characters were apt to be. He had 
always acted friendly, even if he 
was a trifle — to him — high-handed 
and abrupt. The girl could not be 
charged against him, for she was 
acting largely on her own. Allison 
rather liked her, anyway. She was 
a credit. 



What else was there? Well, the 
scene he had witnessed by means of 
the search-beam. But in itself that 
was only interesting and amusing, 
except, perhaps, to the blond chap 
concerned. It was just the confusion 
of the fellow’s resemblance to him- 
self that summoned those nameless 
fears. He could conclude that some- 
body, very much like himself, had 
simply undergone some sort of 
scientific ceremony ending with a 
kiss. 

But that was not a ceremonial kiss 
— it was shamelessly ardent. Could 
there be love — mating — between two 
such opposites? A wedding, per- 
haps, since it was public. 

A wedding! Jones’ last words, 
anent his “service,” still rang in his 
ears. “It is of vital importance to 
the fecundity of our race.” No 
forced marriage of his to one of 
those top-heavy heads — even to Miss 
Brown — would have any effect on 
that. 

Another remark of Jones. His 
“service” had to do with “applied 
and very, very practical ethnology.” 

The worst was certainly those in- 
terminable rows of doll faces. He 
could never have actually seen them, 
surely; they would have to be sym- 
bols of the unconscious, standing 
for something else. But what else? 

And why the resemblance of that 
young fellow to himself — and, there- 
fore, to the doll faces? That could 
not be coincidence. 

Allison gave it up. He knew only 
that a nameless oppression sat on his 
heart, and that he, who had seldom 
been afraid, was now afraid. 

He was roused by a light knock 
on the door. He rose; Miss Brown 
entered ; and some one in brown 
closed the door behind her. She 
was smiling radiantly and held in 
her hands a curious fruit something 

AST— 3 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



49 



like a very large soft-skinned sapo- 
dilla. 

“Eat it,” she said. “It is very 
nourishing and very good.” 

Allison thanked her, broke it and 
gave her half. He found it good in- 
deed. He had not realized he was 
so hungry. She watched him with 
an expression of joy that would not 
come off. 

“Why do you smile so?” he asked. 
“You weren’t feeling so cheerful 
when you left.” 

She laughed and shook her head, 
and would not tell him. 

“You’ll find out!” she promised. 

Something occurred to Allison, 
and he sat on the cot and pulled the 
girl gently down by his side. The 
watchlike search-beam was still ad- 
justed to the auditorium, and he 
turned his wrist delicately in 
various directions till he found it 
again. 

“What is that place?” he asked. 

She gave him a look of fright. 
“Please don’t ask!” she begged. “I 
can’t tell you! I — I’ll get in awful 
trouble!” 

“From Jones?” 

She nodded. He debated whether 
to ask her the explanation of what 
he had witnessed and decided it was 
useless. He peered into the dial of 
the instrument. Her soft hand came 
to take it away, but he guarded it 
with his own and kept on looking. 

He touched a stem, and the pic- 
ture came clearer. The audience was 
there as before, and the space within 
the railing empty; but, as he 
watched, two familiar figures en- 
tered from a doorway on the left, 
and between them rolled a third on 
the wheeled table. Jones and his 
surgeonlike accessory were bringing 
in another victim. 

The girl reached forth her hand 
again. “Please don’t!” she pleaded 

AST-4 



softly. “I shouldn’t have let you 
have it, only — only ” 

“In a minute!” he cried irritably, 
keeping her hand away. 

The figures had started for the 
cage. As before, the man was placed 
in one chair and a native woman, 
promptly entering, in the other. She 
was anaesthetized, and both were 
fitted with the headbands. Then all 
left. Jones pulled the switch, and 
there was the expected burst of vari- 
colored light. 

Allison kept his eyes glued to the 
man, unable to make him out 
through the glass, fearful, deep 
down, of what he might see. Jones 
and the others reentered the cage. 
The man and woman were revived; 
freed, went out; and far away in 
his little room in the building Alli- 
son started with shock. The man 
who had emerged, the man who even 
then was kissing ardently that ugly 
woman — he, too, looked like him- 
self. 

Prickles of fear ran all over the 
Earthman’s body. “Who was that 
man?” he demanded of the girl. 
“Who was it?” he repeated, roughly 
grasping her arms. 

She shook her head and sobbed 
out she dared not tell. He let her 
go; rose and paced about the room. 

After a little she came to him. 
“Don’t be mad with me,” she pleaded 
softly. “I’ll tell you some of it — 
a little.” She paused, gathering 
courage, then said: “That instru- 
ment’s the way we make people fall 
in love with each other here. It does 
something in their heads.” 

Allison stood still, struck with 
amazement at her words. She pulled 
his sleeve; took his hands. 

“Arthur,” she said tenderly. “Ar- 
thur.” He looked down at her. 
“Don’t be mad,” she went on, smil- 
ing a little, but we will marry. You 
will love me. I just arranged it with 



50 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Mr. Jones. He’s coming up for us 
next. Though I didn’t have to be 
made to fall in love with you. Ar- 
thur — aren’t you listening? We’ll 
be so happy, and then you won’t 
have to marry one of those ugly 
other women, and then you’ll never 
want to go back to your horrid 
Earth! Never!” 

FOR SOME time Allison looked 
at her; then he freed his hands and 
turned toward the door. “Sister, I’m 
checking out!” 

She suspected what he meant. 
“What are you going to do?” she 
cried. “You can’t go away! Mr. 
Jones won’t let you!” 

“Miss 891-X, you’ve no idea how 
good I am at handling guys like 
that. I’m a primitive, you know.” 
He felt worlds better, already. It 
was the waiting, a helpless prisoner 
facing the unknown, that had got 
him so down before. Now he had 
made a decision, and the promise of 
action, even of conflict, tuned him to 
his old accustomed pitch. 

But the girl would fight to keep 
him. She threw herself on his chest 
and begged and pleaded. 

“But Arthur,” she said, “you’ll 
like it after you’re changed. You’ll 
never know any difference, except 
that you’ll love me. Don’t you see ?” 
He held her off. “Miss Brown, 
I’m sorry, but I don’t want to like 
to be any other way than I am now. 
You go down to that damn machine; 
get ’em to make you fall in love 
with some nice local boy.” 

A noise was heard at the door. 
At once he jumped and wedged his 
body behind it. “Hide! Here they 
are!” he whispered. “Quick! Under 
the bed! There may be trouble.” 
Trembling, the girl obeyed. Alli- 
son stepped back. Jones entered, 
and his hooded assistant followed 

k 



with the wheeled table and closed 
the door. 

The ethnologist wasted no time. 
“Jones,” he said, “it’s all off. You 
will kindly arrange to send me back 
to Earth.” 

The out-worlder showed less sur- 
prise than Allison expected. 

“But my dear Doctor Allison,” he 
objected, “you can’t mean to change 
your mind now. You are here; 
thousands of our scientists are as- 
sembled; we’ve come even now to 
conduct you to the place where your 
service is to begin.” 

He drew close. Allison turned a 
little, and watched him like a hawk. 
Jones continued, soothingly: 

“Your trepidations are natural, 
but in a few minutes you’ll be laugh- 
ing at yourself for ever having en- 
tertained them. You just see.” 

He raised his right hand to clap 
Allison in good-fellow manner on 
the shoulder, but the pat never 
landed. Quick as a cat the Earth- 
man wheeled and caught his wrist. 
The man, surprised, persisted, and 
he was strong; but Allison was 
stronger, and, clasping his left arm 
about the other’s body, putting all 
his power behind short, savage jabs, 
he forced the hand back in toward 
its owner’s chest. 

“Take — some of — your own — medi- 
cine — doctor !” 

The hand turned, and without a 
word Jones slumped to the floor, un- 
conscious. 

At once Allison was leaping to- 
ward the assistant, and before the 
fellow knew what had happened he 
lay sprawling on the floor beside 
the other. Harmless as he had 
seemed, the ethnologist took no 
chances. He reached for the relaxed 
right arm of Jones and pressed its 
palm into the prone man’s arm. He 
went limp immediately. Allison 
rose. 



i 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



51 



“Act two,” he said. “And two cur- 
tains.” 

He looked under the cot and 
laughed to see the way the wide- 
eyed girl there was trembling. 

“Come out, Miss 23 — PDQ,” he 
said. “The war’s over.” 

She pushed out and stood up. He 
went and knelt over Jones. “In- 
genious little 'weapons you have 
hereabouts,” he commented. A thin, 
rubberish sack lay flat in the man’s 
palm, and from it led a tube to a 
short, hollow-tipped needle placed 
projecting from the lower end of 
the heel, just out of reach of the 
fingers. The instrument stuck 
there of itself. He pulled it off and 
placed it in his own right palm. 

“They’ll kill you!” the girl said, 
tears in her eyes. 

“I hope not,” he answered lightly. 
“I’ll be moving pretty fast.” He 
laughed. “You should know how I 
escaped from the Mutrantian Ti- 
tans! 

“Is anybody outside that door?” 
he asked, pointing. 

She nodded. 

He went to it, took position on one 
side and knocked. The door opened 
slightly, and a hand, wrist, and 
sleeve showed. Allison touched the 
hand with the heel of his right palm 
— and pulled an unconscious, white- 
clad attendant into the room. He 
laid him neatly by the others and 
looked again at the needle. 

“Aye, ingenious!” he said. 

“How are you going to get away?” 
the girl asked. 

For answer, he queried: “Where’s 
your space port?” 

“Oh, it’s way over on the other 
side of the city. They’d catch you.” 

“Do you have air-cars?” 

She nodded. 

“Where can I get one? On the 
roof, maybe?” 

“Yes,” she said reluctantly. 



“There are stairs down the hall,” 
she added, indicating. 

This looked promising. Allison 
was sure he could work anything 
that could fly. 

He searched the three men, find- 
ing no weapon; then, suggesting 
that Miss Brown turn her back, he 
exchanged clothes with the assistant 
in white. The helmet was much too 
large, but he remedied that by pad- 
ding it with a strip torn off the hem 
of the attendant’s robe. 

With this in hand he stood for a 
moment before the slender girl. He 
remembered the search-beam; re- 
moved it and strapped it again on 
her wrist. She had remained sur- 
prisingly passive. 

' “You must get out of here!” he 
warned her. Her eyes were full of 
tears. 

He took her in his arms and kissed 
her lips. “Good-by, little one,” he 
murmured. “Good, good luck to 
you!” 

He put on the helmet. Only his 
square shoulders might give him 
away outside. He would depress 
them as much as possible. He 
stepped to the partly opened door 
— and then at last she spoke. 

“Oh, Arthur,” she cried, “be care- 
ful! Get safe away! But don’t for- 
get me ! Come back to me some day, 
if you can ! I’ll be here always, wait- 
ing!” 

Allison squeezed her hand, then 
turned and went out. Sweet girl, 
he thought. He liked her very 
much. 

IV. 

ONLY ONE man was in sight, a 
man in brown like one Allison had 
overcome, and he was approaching 
along the way Allison himself had 
to go. Walking rapidly, eyes 



52 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



straight ahead, he passed him with- 
out attracting attention. 

The corridor was of the kind he 
had seen with the search-beam. 
Scores of doorways, identical with 
the one he had left, lined both its 
sides. Ahead might be the elevator, 
if he was headed in the right direc- 
tion. 

He was ; and he came to it quickly 
— and had there a bad moment. On 
drawing abreast, the car came level 
with his floor, and off stepped two 
men clad like himself, trundling an- 
other wheeled table between them. 
One called after him a barbarous- 
sounding phrase, but he continued 
on, affecting not to hear. An open 
spiral staircase showed at his left, 
and with relief he turned in and 
started up. He would like to have 
run, but did not dare. He might 
meet some one. 

As he climbed he wondered how 
many poor victims were being taken 
unconscious to that scientific hy- 
meneal altar. Those fellows had en- 
joyed their marriage kiss! In his 
mind he could hear them at their 
love-making. “How brightly shine 
the stars on your incomparable scalp 
to-night!” “How lovely that line 
where your lips kiss your neck!” 
Ugh! 

He shuddered and climbed faster, 
passed the landing next above, and 
continued up to where a closed door 
barred his way. He opened it, 
stepped through, and found himself 
on the roof. 

It was daylight, and a small sun 
shone warmly. Blinking in its sud- 
den glare, he made out that he was 
in the middle of a large flat open 
area floored with pink marble. In 
several scattered places were other 
roof doors like the one he had 
emerged from, and straight ahead 
stood a row of transparent objects 
that had to be the air-cars. One mas- 



sive-headed man in purple was 
loitering near them, but he was the 
only person in sight. Allison strode 
casually over to the nearest car, 
studying it closely as he went. 

It, like the others, was small, 
hardly five feet high, with open 
sides and streamlined shells of a 
stuff like glass, front and back. 
Within was one wide seat, in front 
of which were three control levers 
which led to a boxed space below. 
It rested on three splayed legs. And 
that was all there was. No motive 
device was apparent, and there were 
no wings or vanes whatever. 

Allison was not pleased to have 
a witness to his first flight, but he 
stepped into the nearest car without 
hesitation and gingerly raised the 
lever he guessed would be the ele- 
vator. The car lifted. Slight pulls 
on another lever turned the nose of 
his craft, and the third gave for- 
ward velocity. It was extremely 
simple. A glance at the man below 
showed that he wasn’t even look- 
ing. Boldly, now, Allison ordered 
the controls, and within a minute he 
was climbing silently a hundred feet 
above the edge of the roof to where 
other air-cars like elongated soap 
bubbles were scattered through the 
sky above. 

Below, and shrinking as he 
climbed, lay a beautiful city. Broad 
ribbons of white streets stretched 
away to all sides, and within them 
lay low, curved, and angled build- 
ings, each its own delicate pastel 
tint. Greens, blues, yellows, and 
purples, octagons of pink, and open 
green plazas everywhere between. 
It was not large, but it was such a 
place as modern architects back on 
Earth were still dreaming of. 

On the far side should be the 
space port, according to the poor lit- 
tle girl of the numbers. Allison anx- 
iously searched, but could spot 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



53 



nothing that looked like one — no 
great open place sprinkled with sil- 
ver ovaloids that would be the ships. 
There was one silver shape well off 
on the right, but it was far too big 
for a space ship, he told himself. 
Still, he’d have a look. He turned 
his car and speeded up. 

As he drew closer he saw that it 
was a ship, and, to his astonishment, 
that he knew it. It was the one be- 
longing to the Mutrantian Titans. 
Two years before. Earth, in making 
overtures for the friendship of Sa- 
turn’s somewhat backward Satellite 
Three, had caused to be made and 
presented as a gift to its govern- 
ment a space ship of tremendous 
size after the famous RV-3 model, 
so popular with her own private 
owners. The ship below was un- 
mistakably that model, and, from its 
size, could only be the one presented 
to the Mutrantians. 

What could its presence here 
mean? Were some of the Titans, 
like himself, here as instruments in 
the schemes of the ultrascientists? 

Allison reached the ship and hov- 
ered high overhead. She lay alone in 
a large circular area, bare except for 
several scattered rows of long, buff- 
colored buildings with rounded tops. 
This was the space port after all; 
the buildings were hangars, and 
their local craft must all be housed 
inside. He lowered, circled, studied 
that bit of terrain. Everything de- 
pended on the raid he was about to 
make. How should he go about it? 
The scene was peaceful enough in 
appearance, and he could not at his 
altitude make out a single figure; 
but he had a great respect for the 
danger potential of a people so ad- 
vanced in science. 

What were the space ships inside 
those hangars like? Had he not 
been a bit too cocky in his assurance 
that he could navigate one? They 



might operate by entirely different 
principles from those he was famil- 
iar with — like the air-car he was in, 
for instance. He might stand like 
a child before an atomic engine in 
the presence of their motivating de- 
vice. 

As he hesitated, a preposterous 
idea invaded his mind. He rejected 
it at once, but it returned, and soon, 
as he faced it, he began to glow with 
the possibilities. Why not try for 
the Mutrantian ship? He was at 
least thoroughly familiar with it, 
and its operation was automatic in 
flight and foolproof. The one great 
problem was the matter of size. The 
ship had been made to a scale ten 
times that of the Earthmen’s, and 
that meant that such a comparative 
midget as he might face extraordi- 
nary difficulties making the trip 
in it. 

In the cool stillness five thousand 
feet in the air Allison laughed. He 
had the answer for that. It would 
be the Titan ship, by all means. He 
much preferred it, now. 

But first he had to get it, and that 
might not be so easy. Especially if 
one of the Titans was inside. He 
lowered the elevating lever and 
dropped cleanly down. 

AT THREE thousand feet, even 
at one, no guard or other field at- 
tendant showed. The port looked 
deserted. “I can make a pretty good 
guess why,” Allison told himself 
with a grin. “Big reception over in 
town. Thousands getting ready for 
the appearance of one Doctor Ar- 
thur Allison, pick of Earth! 

“Earth’s dumb-bells!” he cor- 
rected. 

He lowered still more; hovered 
motionless fifty feet over the mam- 
moth length of silver. A fifth of 
a mile, it lay stretched out. It was 
three hundred feet in the beam. 



54 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



He set his ship in a glide down 
and around the gently curving flank. 
The ground rose to meet him; the 
side turned sheer. He saw that the 
midship port was open. A gangway 
from the field reached up and 
touched its lower lip. 

There was still no sign of any one 
about. He lowered his car to the 
yawning forty-foot-wide cavern; 
peered; turned his ship and nosed 
through. Beyond the port lock, sev- 
enty feet within, he sunk to a land- 
ing and stepped out. 

He was within, but not safe. 
There might be a Mutrantian, or a 
guard. He would have to recon- 
noiter. 

For ten minutes he disappeared 
into the dark bowels of the ship, 
and when he emerged he was drag- 
ging the limp form of a man, whom 
he placed on the top of the gang- 
way. There had been a guard. 

A few seconds later he had re- 
turned to his car and ascended the 
forward wall. Faintly, he saw what 
he wanted. Hovering motionless, he 
reached out and pushed hard on two 
buttons the size of saucers. Behind 
him the two massive lock doors 
knifed closed, enveloping him with- 
in pitchy darkness. 

Then, with extreme of caution, 
foot by foot, he directed his car 
ahead. After a little he turned right, 
toward where a dim light came from 
the control room, far up in the nose 
of the ship. More rapidly now he 
proceeded, through the long, longi- 
tudinal passageway and into the 
Gargantuan reach of wanly lighted 
control room. He climbed higher, 
and aimed for the panel of huge 
disks that were the control buttons. 

Hovering by their side, he reached 
out and pushed at three he knew. 

The floor started rapidly to rise. 
The ship was lifting. With all the 
skill he had, he met the floor. 



V. 

ALLISON did not gloat at his 
luck in getting off, for it was far 
from certain that he would be able 
to win clear. Thousands of people 
would see the ship rise, and that 
might bring quick action. He had 
no idea what the offensive weapons 
of the natives might be. At the 
worse, they might bring him down 
with some destroying ray; but he 
counted on their not doing that. He 
was supposed to be a valuable prop- 
erty, and they unquestionably would 
want to take him alive. He could 
afford to chance their powers. 

In his comparatively diminutive 
size, and faced by the danger of 
quick discovery, it had been impos- 
sible to investigate the stores of the 
ship before taking off, but in this he 
did not take so great a chance as 
may be thought. There were, 
primarily, only the factors of air, 
temperature, food, water, starting 
power, and navigation, and in all of 
these the probabilities were in his 
favor. 

He was so tiny that there should 
be enough air in the craft to last him 
for a long trip even if the air-re- 
newers were idle. The temperature 
was maintained automatically. As 
for food and water, the ship would 
at least have the “iron rations” and 
reserve tanks of water which inter- 
planetary flying regulations re- 
quired ships at all times to carry 
against emergency. 

That the ship had the necessary 
starting power was already proved 
by the fact that she had lifted and 
her acceleration was being main- 
tained. She was of the more recent 
type that utilized solar rays in 
transit, and there was therefore no 
concern over energy once she had 
got out into the airless void where 
the sun’s rays shone always burning 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



55 



hot. Navigation was all but auto- 
matic and would not concern him 
until he was sure he was out of the 
atmosphere. 

His immediate concern was light, 
and to get it he would use the un- 
usual tool provided to his hand— -the 
air-car. It would be a space ship 
within a space ship. It would serve 
him for the transportation. He 
laughed at his audacity in having 
thought of it. 

Carefully he took off, and rose 
into the dangerous dimness that en- 
veloped him on all sides. One error 
with the controls and he might dash 
into a wall, or the ceiling, and the 
end of his career as a scientist-ad- 
venturer would be a hundred-foot 
fall to the floor of what would turn 
out to be his coffin. He knew about 
where the switch was, but the multi- 
plied height and the darkness made 
finding it critical. It was necessary 
to control his air-car with one hand 
while he felt with the other over 
the surface of the wall. 

It took a little time, but eventu- 
ally he found it. Using all his 
strength, he turned it on. 

At sight of the vast control room 
under full light he got a new sense 
of his audacity— -and his insignif- 
icance. Around him stretched a 
chamber three hundred feet long, 
and fully two thirds that in width 
and height. He had lived with the 
Mutrantians, and so had experience 
with interiors multiplied in size, but 
these dimensions for the control 
room of a space ship took his breath 
away. The chart table alone reached 
thirty feet up from the floor. Only 
an air-car would so much as enable 
him to get around. 

He decided to investigate the food 
situation while the ship was getting 
out of the atmosphere. Carefully 
turning his car, the ethnologist 
glided down to within ten feet of 



the floor, and from that height 
skimmed back through the doorway 
into the corridor, where he came to 
a stop amidships, on the port side, 
in front of the galley door. 

Here, for the first time, he had 
trouble. The door was closed, and 
there was the job of opening it. He 
found the handle, a curved, thick, 
iron bar more than a yard long, 
without difficulty, but all the 
strength of his right arm would not 
serve to lift it. He rested a moment 
and thought it over. Any tools he 
might find up in the tool locker 
would be far too heavy for him to 
work with from the car, so he de- 
cided to use the car itself. 

Delicately maneuvering, he got 
the knobbed end of the handle 
hooked over the footboard of his 
car. Then, ready, he raised the ele- 
vator control of the car and at the 
same time directed its nose hard in- 
ward. The handle lifted and the 
door opened. 

“Problem and solution,” he 
thought, pleased, pushing the door 
back with the nose of his craft as 
elephants were used to push circus 
freight cars around. Allison prided 
himself on his capacity to solve 
problems. 

Inside, there was again the need 
of finding the light switch, and this 
time, the room being in pitch dark- 
ness, he had far more trouble; but 
at length he found it and turned it 
on. No fresh provisions were in evi- 
dence anywhere,' so he skimmed 
across to the row of gigantic lock- 
ers where canned food and water 
should be found. 

EVERY locker was closed, so 
once more Allison used the car to 
pry up one of the handles, this time 
pulling, instead of pushing. He 
found this harder— and more dan- 
gerous. For as the door started 



56 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



slowly open under the force he was 
exerting, the end of the handle 
slipped off the floor board and he 
suddenly found himself hurtling at 
dizzying speed into the opposite 
wall. Only in the nick of time did 
he cut his controls and zoom, to lose 
momentum at the ceiling. 

“Phew!” he exclaimed. He rea- 
lized that he was getting dull and 
tired. He could not have come out 
of that long period of enforced un- 
consciousness with much reserve of 
strength. 

He glided down to the locker and 
looked in. There were the cans, just 
as in the Earthmen’s ships — rows 
and rows of giant tin containers, 
stacked a hundred feet to the ceil- 
ing. Synthetic food tablets, all of 
one kind, from the labels in English. 

With more care he opened the 
locker adjoining and found there 
similar cans of water. He felt con- 
siderably relieved. He was certain, 
at least, to eat and drink. 

He now flew back to the main 
cabin for the one last thing to be 
done. The ship until then had been 
flying outward blindly; it remained 
for him to set it on its course for 
Earth. He climbed his little craft 
over to the great chart table to the 
forward end of the room where were 
the banks of dials and the rows of 
colored buttons whereby the ship 
was controlled. 

A glance at a dial half as large as 
his ship showed a negligible amount 
of air outside, so he advanced thirty 
feet to hover like a humming bird 
in front of a green button with a 
large 3 on its face, and, feeling a lit- 
tle sentimental, reached out and 
pushed it in. Farther on he pushed 
in another, which would give him 
the ship’s maximum acceleration. 
Then he glided to a landing on the 
immense flat top of the chart table 



and sat down. The rest was up to 
the ship’s automatic navigator. 

It was equal to the job. Its ultra- 
sensitive receivers picked up and 
identified every major planetary 
body in the solar system and sent 
the information through an over- 
lapping labyrinth of seventy-two 
circuits where every navigation fac- 
tor of location, spacial relation, 
planetary gravital pulls, ship’s speed 
and acceleration and deceleration, 
planetary speeds and orbits, ship’s 
destination, and so forth, were sec- 
ond by second electrically arranged 
and coordinated into the necessary 
resultant course; and it put the ship 
on that course, and corrected in- 
finitesimal strayings, and would 
without attention start deceleration 
at the proper time, and bring the 
ship gently to ground in a place re- 
served for it in Earth’s great space 
port at New York. All that Allison 
had to do, therefore, was set the 
buttons for destination and accelera- 
tion. 

The ethnologist was tired and lay 
down where he was. He had done 
all that was possible. If his enemies 
followed and took steps to destroy 
him, it was too bad, but there was 
nothing he could do about it. This 
was a private ship and was equipped 
with no defensive screens or ray bat- 
teries. 

At that, death was preferable to 
life with his normal instincts so al- 
tered by their devilish ingenuity 
that he would be a happy slave to 
them for the rest of his days. A 
man had an inalienable right to his 
own personality, and as a free cit- 
izen of the Federation of Earth he 
was never going to submit to hav- 
ing his taken away. Miss Brown 
wasn’t so bad, but what if they were 
to marry him to one of those chin- 
less damsels? What of his career in 
ethnology, so brilliantly started? 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



57 



Well, the outcome was now in the 
hands of the gods. 

He was surprised at how fatigued 
he was. He was hungry and thirsty, 
too, but he’d have to attend to that 
later; he hadn’t strength just now 
to undertake the task of getting 
stuff out of those gigantic tins; or 
even to go back in the darkness of 
the stern and seek out one of the 
mammoth beds that would be there. 
He would sleep where he was. 

He did sleep, a bearded doll on 
the chart table thirty feet up off the 
floor. He was almost the length of 
the sharp-pointed dividers a dozen 
yards away, and against the ruler 
that lay by his side he measured 
exactly six inches. 

ALLISON awoke stiff and aching 
but refreshed, and in high good hu- 
mor. He seemed to have slept for 
some time and was not yet burned to 
a cinder by a heat-ray, or dissolved 
into nothingness by a disintegrator; 
the solar motors of the ship were 
whining faintly but evenly; and be- 
fore him stretched an adventure 
such as no man had ever had before. 

He was going home. He was 
going to arrive safely. And he was 
going to descend spectacularly, in 
the greatest space ship ever built, 
with a story that would set three 
thousand million tongues awagging, 
and with a marvelous little air-car 
whose motive power was a mystery 
that all the physichemists of Earth 
would pounce happily on until they 
had its secret unraveled for Earth’s 
own use. 

And on the way he would have the 
pleasure of meeting, with his wits, 
all the bizarre problems which his 
discrepancy to the size of the ship 
would bring. 

Buoyantly he jumped into his air- 
car and guided it to the galley; a 
drink first, and then food. But the 



water tins were twelve feet high, of 
tough, thick metal, sealed tight, and 
must have weighed, each one, sev- 
eral tons. Here was his first prob- 
lem. The best solution lay in melt- 
ing his way in with a hand heat- 
ray. He found one, a cylinder eight 
feet long and two thick, in one of 
the control-room tool lockers, after 
he had lifted up its lid with the help 
of his car. 

With lengths of rope he found 
there, and again aided by the lifting 
power of his car, he got the heat- 
ray out of the box and into the mid- 
dle of the galley floor. Next prob- 
lem: how to get it aimed at the top 
edge of the bottom tin in one of the 
stacks. He flew back to the tool 
box and brought back, slung under- 
neath, a seven-foot file. Then, 
changing the ropes to the heat-ray 
again, he lifted it to rest on the 
file; and after many trials, and get- 
ting out of his car each time to 
sight along the cylinder, he got it 
at approximately the angle he 
wanted. 

He had taken pains to leave the 
push-button switch facing upward, 
and now he vaulted to a seat on the 
rear end of the cylinder and worked 
his way up to it. When he got there 
he pushed to his feet and stepped on 
it with all his weight. 

A thin pinkish beam speared out, 
and a glow appeared on the side of 
the tin, a little lower than he had 
wanted. In seconds the metal 
melted, and before Allison could re- 
move his foot a geyser of steam and 
scalding water shot out, spattering 
the floor in all directions. Some of 
it hit his arm, burning him painfully 
even through the sleeve, and causing 
him to lose his balance and slip to 
the floor. 

The heat over there was terrific, 
but when the water in the tin had 
cooled, he would be able to get a 



58 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



drink. He smiled, a little grimly. 
Opening that tin had taken three 
hours. 

While it was cooling he repeated 
the process on a tin of synthetic 
food in the locker adjoining, this 
time stepping briefly on and off the 
button several times, until he saw 
that the hole had been made. 

This took another hour. And still 
he couldn’t approach the lockers. 
He wiped his forehead and sat down 
to wait. He was exhausted with his 
exertions and faint from lack of 
food. It was not quite the lark he 
had anticipated, pitting his wits 
against the problems that arose from 
his comparative lack of size. 

The little air-car might have 
meant the difference between life 
and death. He had called on it 
heavily for many hours, and had no 
means of knowing how much longer 
it would function without its energy 
giving out. Hereafter, he decided, 
he would use it as little as possible. 

He lay back, and before he knew 
it was asleep. When he awoke he 
found the tins cooled, and ate and 
drank, and then slept some more. 
And when he awoke for the third 
time the long, deadly montonous 
routine of his journey began. 

THERE WAS nothing to do. 
The navigation of the ship was en- 
tirely automatic, so Allison could 
have no concern in that. The two 
tins he had opened had provided him 
with food and water that would last 
many times the probable duration of 
his trip back home. It was highly 
concentrated, predigested stuff, so 
that no time could be expended in 
its preparation. He had no duties. 
There were nowhere any books 
which might afford an opportunity 
for reading or translation. 

Even the solar engine, the auto- 
matic navigator, and other machin- 



ery were locked inaccessibly in the 
spaces above the ceiling and below 
the floor, so he could not watch and 
study them. Had he dared to use the 
air-car as much as he wanted, he 
might in time have opened almost 
every door, locker, and cubby in the 
space ship; but many of them, in- 
cluding the radio cubby, were 
locked, and a few others stubborn, 
so their contents, if any, could not 
be reached. Only too well had the 
big ship been cleaned and all acces- 
sories put away after the Mutran- 
tian’s arrival at that land of mys- 
tery. 

Men can spend their time sleep- 
ing, eating, working, and in recrea- 
tion. Allison slept all he could ; 
stretched out his meals of sandy, 
tasteless food tablets as long as he 
could. He made a bed under the 
chart table out of one of the coarse 
sheets from a Mutrantian bunk. 

He started a complicated mechan- 
ism which would enable him to hang 
suspended before the eyepiece of the 
telescope which gave vision of the 
outside, and from there manipulate 
its controls, some of them thirty 
feet away — to stop when it became 
apparent that it would take far 
longer than the duration of his jour- 
ney to finish it. And also he, for 
four or five hours each day, contin- 
ued his monograph on the Mutran- 
tian Titans by scratching the words 
laboriously on the floor of the con- 
trol room with the points of the hun- 
dred-pound dividers left on the 
chart table. 

For the rest of the time he 
prowled about the floor of the ship, 
investigating every corner like a rat 
without a hole. A toy man in those 
spaces, he skulked about ; ran, to 
keep in condition ; paced up and 
down, integrating ethnological data 
stored in his memory. And dreamed 
of the day when the ship would 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



59 



alight on. the welcome bosom of 
Earth, and he’d be freed of the in- 
tolerable burden of life under the 
handicap of surroundings so co- 
lossal. 

Days passed so, and weeks. The 
ship had long since been decelera- 
ting. The desire to get back into nor- 
mal surroundings became an obses- 
sion in his mind. To sit at a table 
again! Friendly faces on the other 
side! Food, real food! And books, 
and work, and the theater, and hu- 
man voices, and spring beds, and 
tools that would fit the hand, and 
things that he could lift! Mobility! 

Sometimes he thought of the 
crowded events of the few short 
hours in the strange civilization left 
behind. Jones. The beautiful girl 
of the numbers. She had really 
loved him. He hoped she had not 
got in trouble. 

Sometimes his thoughts were 
darker. Those two men — should he 
have made some wild quixotic at- 
tempt at their rescue? 

Perhaps there were yet others 
locked in those rooms. 

Why did those men so resemble 
him? And why that still-recurring 
image of the doll faces? Intermi- 
nable rows of them. Each one with 
his own face, and each one, some- 
how, himself! 

Now he would never know. 

He was sitting thinking these 
thoughts in a corner of the control 
room one day when a jar, accompa-* 
nied by a dull rumble, went over 
the ship, and her motors stopped. 
Allison sprang to his feet. He had 
landed! The journey was over! 
The great ship had brought him 
back at last to Earth! 

He ran to his little air-car, parked 
under the telescope mounting, and 
jumped inside. He would give his 
welcomers a surprise. He would 
open the port doors and skim non- 



chalantly out over their heads. 
Within seconds he was gliding 
down the corridor and turning left 
along the transverse passage to 
where the port-lock buttons were 
located. 

He pushed them, inner and outer 
in turn, and the huge metal doors 
slid back. Outside it was night, but 
a bright light flooded the wide open- 
ing. Fifty feet in the air, far above 
the heads of those who would be 
waiting, he skimmed out. 

But he never received the wel- 
come he expected. A titanic figure 
stepped forth and blocked his way; 
a hand eight feet across stabbed out 
and grabbed his little car; a thumb 
and forefinger that were colossal 
reached in and plucked him out. 

For a second he was carried in 
dizzying flight through the air — 
and then he was dropped lightly 
into a Gargantuan side coat pocket. 

VI. 

ALLISON was stunned. All he 
could think was that he had landed 
on Saturn’s Satellite Three and was 
again in the hands of the Mutrantian 
Titans. The ship, not obeying the 
button marked 3, had taken him back 
to the land where it was owned. He 
was in the hands of the enemy ; 
they’d not forget the damage he had 
done in his spectacular escape from 
them a few months before. 

Tears of rage filled his eyes, that 
the long difficult journey had come 
to this. He had apparently been 
expected, and was being taken even 
now to the place where revenge 
would be taken. Out of the frying 
pan! He knew the Mutrantians. 

He could hardly hope to escape 
again, but the instinct for self- 
preservation was strong, and he set 
about seeing what might be done. 
The pocket he was in was deep; his 



60 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



upraised hands did not come within 
two feet of the top. But he thought 
he could make it. Grasping the can- 
vaslike stuff he pulled himself up, 
inch by inch, until he got a grasp 
on the top edge, and then, straining 
mightily in the close press of the 
folds about him, he pulled himself 
up and got his arms hooked over, 
fyeneath the flap. 

No sooner was he there than there 
came a stunning pressure through 
the flap, and he was shaken violently 
back down. 

For a while he rested; and then, 
more quietly, he repeated the at- 
tempt. But the Titan was on his 
guard and again, more roughly, he 
was shaken down. 

Only now, for the first time, did 
panic sweep over him. As best he 
could he controlled his feelings and 
considered what to do. But what 
could any one do, with his insignif- 
icant size in that extraordinary posi- 
tion? He was being carried half a 
hundred feet from the ground; even 
if he could get out of the pocket, 
how could he hope to get down and 
away? With a knife he might do 
some minor damage to the Titan 
and then try to cut his way out — but 
his knife was gone. He had 
searched himself a dozen times on 
the space ship, for to have had one 
then would have saved him many 
hours of toil; but all his pocket 
things had been removed while he 
was unconscious. 

Nevertheless, almost automati- 
cally, by old habit, he started the 
search — and at what he found hope 
sprang to his heart and his nerves 
keyed to new possibilities. He 
still had the hypodermic. For the 
whole of the trip the little sack and 
needle, unneeded, had lain wrapped 
in a piece of bedding in his pocket. 
Carefully he got it out and uncov- 
ered it. It seemed in good order. 



If only it would have effect on a 
creature so large ! 

He attached it in his palm. He 
could not use it as he was, for the 
coat pocket was swinging free from 
the Titan’s body, and its tiny needle 
would never reach. He would have 
to bring his carrier’s hand to the 
pocket, as before. 

To do it he set up a terrific com- 
motion in the narrow space where 
he was. He bent and sprang and 
kicked and flung his arms about 
violently — and, as he had expected, 
from the other side of the pocket 
came a smothering pressure. Now 
was the time! Violently twisting 
his right arm free, he plunged its 
palm three times with all the 
strength he had at the nearest place 
the canvas pressed inward. At once 
the pressure from outside was re- 
moved ; he had the sensation of fall- 
ing, upsupported; and with a ter- 
rific jolt he came to a dead stop, 
dazed, bruised, and almost smoth- 
ered. 

He twisted free of the cloth 
against his face and rested, listen- 
ing. There was no sign of motion, 
now. Cautiously, then, he squirmed 
his way up to the top of the pocket 
and got out. 

He saw that he had brought the 
giant down on the sidewalk of an 
immense, deserted street — and, to 
his dismay, that he was lying on 
his left side, on top of the pocket 
which he had counted on to contain 
the air-car. Not having it would 
greatly lessen his chances of getting 
away; but there was nothing to be 
done about salvaging it. He could 
only set out on foot and travel as 
great a distance as possible before 
the unconscious Titan came to, or 
was discovered. His objective 
would be the space ship he had just 
left, for only that ship offered a way 
to get free of the planet. 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



61 



From the Titan’s position Allison 
could tell the direction he had been 
going, and without further delay he 
started running back in the other 
direction. 

The street he was on was of 
fabulous proportions, and in spite 
of his former experiences among the 
Mutrantians he took in his sur- 
roundings with awe. The street, 
from curb to curb, was over one hun- 
dred and fifty yards in width, and 
the sidewalk he was on not less than 
fifty. On his side, hundreds of 
yards into the sky, towered one 
colossal building of many stories, 
and along the other was a hundred- 
foot fence, all of wooden planks ten 
feet wide. Electric street lamps 
shone like fixed star-shells at long 
intervals down the street to where, 
half a mile away, shone neon and 
other colored tubes marking an im- 
portant intersection. 

Allison slowed down to a walk. 
A hundred yards ahead loomed the 
glass-and-metal canopy before the 
entrance of the great house he was 
passing, and just to one side, al- 
ready outlining him in its powerful 
rays, was a street lamp. That meant 
danger. His safest course would 
be to get down into the street and 
pass by close to the curb. 

He crossed to the edge of the 
pavement and looked down. It was 
an eight-foot drop. 

Sitting first, then turning and 
holding by his hands, he lowered 
himself over the stone ledge and 
dropped to the street. From there, 
hugging close to the sheltering curb 
wall, he passed safely under the 
light and beyond in one long sprint; 
but as he slowed to a walk he began 
to worry how he ever would be able 
to cross the street he was coming 
to. If he had only been able to get 
his air-car ! 



TWO EYES of fire turned Alli- 
son’s way in the distance and 
quickly grew to alarming propor- 
tions. Could they belong to some 
gigantic animal? He tried to scram- 
ble up over the curb onto the pave- 
ment; but it was too high, and, 
paralyzed by fear, he crouched low 
at its base, instead, and saw the eyes 
grow to the size of hogsheads, and 
grow and grow, devouring him with 
merciless light — till at the terrific 
speed of two hundred and fifty miles 
an hour they passed him with queer 
noises only twenty feet away, pull- 
ing him head over heels after in the 
wind displaced by their passage. As 
he picked himself up and looked 
back he saw a titanic bulk with one 
evil red eye diminish down the 
street. 

An automobile! 

That was strange. The Mutran- 
tians had very few automobiles. 

Anyhow, he had again been lucky. 
It had not stopped for — or seen — 
the Titan he had left unconscious 
behind. 

He hurried on; alternated walk- 
ing and running for a while. His 
victim might revive any second, for 
the tiny amount of fluid he had in- 
jected would hardly keep him under 
long, and he was still in his imme- 
diate vicinity. 

As he approached the intersect- 
ing street he saw other autos pass 
by there, and the shape of them was 
several times familiar. A fear that 
would not down took possession of 
him, and goose-flesh rose all over 
his body as he hurried yet nearer. 
It was preposterous, it was too hor- 
ribly fantastic, the fear he had; but 
there was no mistaking those body 
lines; and the glass-and-metal 
canopy before the entrance of the 
great house he still was passing — 
that, too, now that he thought of it, 
had looked familiar. 



62 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



He was very close to the street 
now, and seeing a ten-foot piece of 
newspaper in his way he picked it 
up and placed it over his head. It 
seemed to him to be as heavy as 
stiff cardboard. Under cover of 
this, still hugging the protecting 
wall of the curb, he stole furtively 
nearer. 

People were passing; colossi; but 
they wore the costumes of Earth- 
men! And the letters on that win- 
dow high up way over there cer- 
tainly looked like “Restaurant.” 

Heart in his throat, Allison ven- 
tured closer and closer to the cor- 
ner. The legend did read restau- 
rant; the passing autos were of 
American make ; the very newspaper 
that was his camouflage bore print- 
ing in gigantic English! And up by 
the street lights were name plates 
such as he had seen a million times 
before — and the numbers on their 
faces told him that he was at Forty- 
ninth Street and First Avenue. 

He was back on Earth. In the 
heart of New York City. Of a New 
York grown colossal, in every di- 
mension, and that had left him and 
him only far down from normal 
size. 

Or, more probable, it was his sur- 
roundings that were normal, and 
he reduced in size. 

What had Jones done to him? 
Why? Why? 

Stunned, stupid with shock, he 
stood there, until he came to full 
realization of his tragic plight. And 
then he sat down under his paper 
and cried. 

Allison sat there in the gutter 
for a long time, and for a while went 
quite out of his mind. A few yards 
away the night traffic of a great 
metropolitan artery streamed up and 
down, while he, the only one of his 
size on Earth, sat utterly helpless 
and hopeless under the miserable 



sheet of wind-blown newspaper that 
alone hid his degradation from the 
eyes of his kind. 

In gallant spirit he had taken up 
the out-worlder’s offer and trusted 
him. When it seemed that he was 
to be betrayed he had with high, 
clear courage won free; run that 
great space ship back to Earth; and 
only now was he to see that it had 
all been for worse than nothing. 
The irony was a knife in his heart; 
and his shame, in that mouselike 
size, was unendurable. 

The traffic thinned; store lights 
went out. The tears on the face of 
the miserable little atom under the 
paper dried away, and in their place 
came an expression of gaunt cour- 
age. Allison knew what he 
would do. 

He would kill Jones. 

That Jones would return for him, 
he had no doubts. He “knew too 
much,” and the out-worlder would 
have either to recapture or destroy 
him. Already he had made the at- 
tempt: — for who, other than some 
agent of his, could it have been that 
had kidnaped him from the space 
ship ? 

He would come to Allison’s labo- 
ratory, and Allison would be ready 
for him. 

Until then, only two men would 
ever see him as he was — his best 
friend, Doctor Heiler, the physicist 
who occupied the other half of the 
top floor where he lived and worked 
at 301 W. 22nd Street, and his old 
college mate Jack Peyton, a strug- 
gling writer who lived around the 
corner from First Avenue on Fif- 
tieth Street. Peyton would have to 
know in order to take him to Heiler, 
for alone he could never get to the 
house where he lived without dis- 
covery, or into Heiler’s quarters 
without great danger of running 
right into the out-worlder. 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



63 



It would be extremely difficult to 
so much as get to Peyton. The 
short block he lived north, twenty 
to the Earthman’s mile, was over 
half a mile to him, and the night 
traffic along First Avenue, mainly 
trucks, was considerable. But Alli- 
son thought he could do it. 

ALLISON waited a while longer 
under his newspaper camouflage, 
then, making a hole in the middle of 
it for his eyes, advanced cautiously 
under it to the great round curve 
which v/as the curb corner itself, 
and sneaked around. There were 
then few passers-by — only the 
trucks, titanic monsters that shook 
the ground under his feet as they 
appeared at terrific speed and passed 
in a discordant jangle of sounds 
quite unlike those heard by normal 
ears. 

He walked at half speed and 
stopped still when, over the verge 
of the curb, he saw a pedestrian ap- 
proach, or, down the street, a truck; 
and all that any one glancing his 
way might have seen was a sheet of 
old newspaper that occasional light 
gusts of wind was blowing along the 
gutter. 

He could not keep his eyes where 
his feet were stepping, and several 
times he tripped and fell, once over 
a stone in his path, and again over 
a twisted package that had contained 
cigarettes. From time to time he 
reached a parked automobile, and 
then he would run until he reached 
its farther side. He found he was 
getting hungry; and, realizing what 
was yet before him, he at one place 
stopped with his paper over a ban- 
ana peeling, lifted back, with an 
effort, one of its flaps, and ate 
briefly of the bit of pulpy fruit that 
remained in its end. 

It took him exactly thirty-seven 
minutes to walk that short block 



north, and by the time he had 
rounded the curb wall on Fiftieth 
Street and seen the vast stretch that 
still lay ahead of him he was grow- 
ing tired. 

Peyton, being very poor, lived in 
one of the few old-fashioned cold- 
water tenement houses that re- 
mained in New York, a house on the 
north side of the street, with a stoop 
of half a dozen high brownstone 
steps. It being June, both doors 
should be open, and allow entrance 
into the dark, bare, smelly hall, half- 
way back, in which were steps which 
led upward, and which he would 
somehow have to climb to reach the 
second-story where his friend’s 
room was. As he remembered it, 
the house v/as about one third the 
long east-west block from the cor- 
ner — nearly a mile, to him. Fie 
hoped devoutly he would be able to 
recognize it. 

He crossed the hundred and fifty 
yards of street-width in one long 
sprint, and fetched up breathless on 
the other side. He got there just in 
time. A seventy-foot young man 
and a sixty-five foot young woman 
turned the corner and started west 
up the street. Under the street 
light, house-high over his head, he 
saw the man talking earnestly to the 
girl. Slowly, his great lips opened 
and closed; but no words could be 
heard. The vibration frequency of 
their tones was far too low for his 
tiny eardrums. Only low rumbles 
and a comic jabber of squeaks and 
squawks — overtones and errant 
noises made by imperfections in the 
vocal apparatus — reached his ears. 

And it was all that would ever 
reach his ears. Unless Doctor Hei- 
ler could make some instrument 

He waited for the two to get well 
ahead. They were probably sweet- 
hearts, he reflected bitterly. How 
could there ever be love for him — a 



64 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



circus side-show freak, whose toy 
proportions could only arouse vul- 
gar gawks from the many and pity 
from the few! He was very proud, 
and pity he would never be able to 
endure. Quite, quite alone, a ludi- 
crous watch charm of a man, he 
would live, until that time when his 
one purpose in life was realized and 
he free to end the whole ironic jest 
forever. 

He thought of the girl of the 
numbers. She had loved him. Some- 
where in the solar system, in a place 
unknown and unattainable, she, a 
girl of his size, was perhaps think- 
ing of him. She, alone of all others, 
held or could hold a place of warmth 
for him in her cheerful, lovely little 
heart. 

He held on to that thought, for it 
was good. 

But there was hard, bitter work 
ahead. He discarded his paper ; 
walked and ran along. the curb until 
he came to the building which he 
recognized as his destination. The 
curb there was his own height, and 
with a jump and vigorous press-up 
he rolled over the edge onto the 
pavement. Above him the two house 
doors stood open, but between rose 
five steps, each eight feet high. In- 
side, up to the second floor, there 
would be a score more. How was he 
to get up them? 

At his height of six inches he was 
exactly one seventeen hundred and 
twenty-eighth of his old self, and his 
strength was in proportion. He 
weighed one and one half ounces. 

VII. 

ALLISON needed a ladder. He 
would • try to make one. It called 
for two upright stems at least six 
feet long ; but less than three shorter 
pieces for rungs, and cord. He set 
about scouring the vicinity of the 



house for things that would serve. 
It was very dark, but he was so 
close to the ground that anything 
not black could be easily discerned. 

Eighty yards from the southwest 
corner of the first step he found a 
fine long stick of straight tough 
stuff that would do for a rung. Its 
end was bulbous and charred. It 
was a used match. 

One hundred and twenty yards 
farther, near the curb, he found an- 
other, a little shorter, and carried it 
back to the first, and both to the 
step. Ten minutes later, over the 
edge of the curb in the street, he 
saw no less than two, only a few 
yards apart. He went down over 
the side and lifted them up, then 
climbed back and carried them, one 
under each arm, over to the others. 
Four would be enough, for the 
rungs. 

He still needed cord and uprights. 
He went forth and searched hard, 
but after fifteen minutes he had not 
found a thing. That pavement was 
kept all too clean. 

He sat down a moment to rest. 
What might he reasonably hope to 
find for uprights among the trifling 
litter of normal-sized human beings? 
Nothing, that he could think of. 

He fared forth again. Bending 
low, and sometimes feeling with his 
finger tips, he searched the gutter 
and pavements of an immense area 
extending as far as four houses 
away; and after one hour and twenty 
minutes he returned lugging three 
hairpins and one long length of 
dirty white rope — string, he once 
would have called it— after him. 

It took all the strength he had to 
bend the hairpins to single length, 
and he might have failed altogether 
had he not been so fortunate to find 
a pretty good crevice angling 
slightly from the straight side of 
one of the blocks that made the 
AST-4 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



65 



pavement — a crevice that held se- 
curely to one side of the hairpin 
while he could apply leverage to the 
end of the other. In one of them, 
the shortest, he rebent a hook near 
one end. 

Harbingers of dawn were streak- 
ing the eastern sky as at last he 
started getting his materials to- 
gether. It did not take long. The 
one length of rope, since he had no 
means of cutting it, could be carried 
in turn to all the rungs on one side, 
and then around to all those on the 
other. When he finished he had a 
heavy ladder five feet high, with 
four rungs each one foot wide. 

With an effort he carried and 
placed it against the first step. It 
lacked three feet of reaching the 
top, but he had arranged for that. 
Grasping the remaining shorter 
hairpin, he climbed his ladder to 
the top, pushed the hairpin over 
the edge of the step above, and fol- 
lowed up after. Then, using the 
hook on the shorter hairpin, he 
pulled the ladder up after him. 

He had climbed the first step. 

In fifteen minutes he was in the 
open vestibule, dragging his hook 
and ladder after him in the long trip 
to mid-hall where the stairway to 
the upper Boors was. 

Allison was never to forget the 
weary time he had climbing that 
new set of steps. Already tired to 
exhaustion, he had for eighteen 
more times to go through with the 
back-breaking routine of climbing 
eight inches upward — pushing his 
hook up and over, before, and with 
it pulling his heavy ladder up, after. 
Daylight came on apace, and 
through the dirty window, halfway 
up, revealed him as a tiny purpose- 
ful doll in a long white dress. When 
the last step had been surmounted, 
Allison sat right down where he was 
for a moment of rest. 

AST— 5 



He needed it. His labors since 
leaving the space ship had been ti- 
tanic, his emotiqns had taken their 
own heavy toll — and his metabolic 
rate was much higher in toy size 
than when normal. 

He got up refreshed, but already 
a little stiff. It occurred to him 
that he might be able to make 
enough noise on Peyton’s door to 
rouse him from sleep; so, rather 
anxious, dragging his hook and lad- 
der after him, he started down the 
long stretch of wooden planking to 
the rear, where his friend’s room 
opened off the left. 

He arrived and knocked; then, 
suspecting that he had made piti- 
fully little noise, he turned his back 
to the door and kicked hard with the 
heel of his shoe. There was no an- 
swer. As he had feared, he was 
unable to make himself heard. 

The crack under the door, how- 
ever, was almost an inch — a foot — 
in depth, and, with considerable re- 
lief, he found he was able to squeeze 
in under it. There was much more 
light on the other side. There was 
enough for him to see at once that 
the couch which served his friend 
for a bed was covered with its usual 
daytime cover and was unoccupied. 

This was a major misfortune. He 
had never considered the possibility 
that his friend might not be there. 

He dropped his hook and ladder 
on the floor and looked around. Two 
windows, one in the back wall and 
one, partly opened, on the left, 
showed up a dirty and disordered 
room. Along the right wall was 
the unoccupied couch; in front of 
the remaining one a sink and a four- 
foot cupboard on whose top rested a 
gas plate; and between the windows 
stood a chair and flimsy card table 
which Peyton used as a desk. These 
made up most of the furnishings of 
the room. 



66 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Allison walked over to the cup- 
board, the door of which stood 
slightly ajar. He was weak for food 
and hoped desperately that some- 
thing loose might be lying around 
that he could eat. He was unable 
to pull the door open any farther, 
so he stepped right through the nar- 
row opening above the one-foot 
board that formed its base. 

There was nothing there. Only 
a row of canned goods — baked beans 
and salmon, in six-foot tins. How 
he hated the sight of tins! He dis- 
appeared around the side of one and 
rummaged in the back — and when 
he came into view again he held five, 
large stale crumbs in his left hand 
and was eating heartily from a six- 
inch piece of cheese in his right. 

He had found a baited mousetrap. 
And food had never tasted so good. 

Munching his cheese and gnawing 
with his side teeth one of the rock- 
hard crumbs he had found, he went 
over and sat down against one leg 
of the couch. His position was still 
precarious; chiefly in the matter of 
food. He had no air-car. What was 
he to do? 

AS HE ATE and considered, Al- 
lison was suddenly aware of move- 
ment off under the far end of the 
couch to his right. Startled, he 
looked, and in the dimness he saw 
two unblinking eyes of yellow fire. 
It was Peyton’s cat. He had utterly 
forgotten that Peyton had a cat. 

The hair rose on the back of his 
neck, and with one push he was 
on his feet. The cat at his move- 
ment bellied forward a few yards, a 
nerve-taut orange tiger, tail lash- 
ing. It was stalking him. 

And he was fair prey. Only 
shoulder-high to the cat would he 
stand; he’d be but one fiftieth its 
weight. Lighter than a mouse. 

He tried frantically to remember 



the cat’s name, but for the life of 
him he couldn’t. It bellied a little 
closer. Desperately he called out 
soothing cat talk; but words that at 
other times might have caused it to 
pur, now had absolutely no effect. 
It was preposterous! That cat 
had been his friend; he had petted 
it a score of times; and now in his 
helpless size it no longer knew him 
and was preparing to take his life. 
For all of his human brains, he, 
weaponless, would not fare even so 
well as a mouse. 

With a thrill he remembered that 
he was not weaponless. Out came 
Jones’ hypodermic, and in a second 
was fitted into his palm. It was a 
poor-enough weapon against the 
lightning speed of a cat’s claw, but 
it would have to do. 

He advanced boldly against the 
cat. He would not have had time 
to reach the cupboard, and he had 
always found it safest, when pos- 
sible, to attack. 

In this, brains showed. The cat, 
surprised, backed; circled; crouched 
again. He foilo-wed it up. Noise- 
lessly it backed toward the door; 
crouched; circled from there. Alli- 
son could then have backed out 
through the crack under the door; 
but that would have got him noth- 
ing; and moreover a strange new 
elation had come to him — the lust 
to conquer. He felt, with that 
weapon, that he could win. For- 
ward to the cat, then, he went; back 
and to the side it retreated, crouch- 
ing every time it stopped. It 
clearly was disconcerted by his un- 
expected advance. 

At the wall under the card table 
it stood its ground, and Allison felt 
that that would be the place to see 
the end. He advanced to within 
its own length of it; stood ready, 
right arm out. The cat opened its 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



67 



mouth in a noiseless hiss, and he was 
drenched with the creature’s breath. 

He gestured with his arm. The 
cat’s front quarters lifted from the 
floor, and, ears flat, made a light- 
ning swipe at his hand. It touched; 
the cat fell slowly to its side; and 
like that it was over. 

Allison brought up his forearm — 
numb, from the violence with which 
it had been hit back. His hand was 
slit deeply in two places, and dark 
blood was dripping copiously from 
the openings. But it had been bet- 
ter to take the cat’s claws there than 
over his body. And it would have 
been his body if he had not forced 
the creature to make a swipe that 
was half defensive. 

He lost no time in tying up the 
cat with a piece of cord found under 
the sink; and then, staggering with 
fatigue, trembling all over with the 
reaction to the encounter, he was 
setting himself to think of a way 
to climb to the basin and get water 
out of the spigot, when to his over- 
powering joy he found a saucer of 
it nearly full, that had been left on 
the floor for the cat. 

He drank, as deeply as he dared, 
then washed and tended his wounds. 
Then, on the cat’s own cushion 
under the couch, he lay down and 
slept. 

The sun showed mid-afternoon 
through the western window when 
he awoke. Terribly stiff, aching all 
over, he got up, saw that the cat 
still lay unconscious, sat a while in 
thought and then set to work. 

He did many curious things, all 
under the terrific handicap usual to 
the predicament of his size. He 
routed out a cardboard box that den- 
tal powder had come in; removed 
the corrugated paper inside; opened 
both ends of the box so that it 
could be pressed fiat, and pushed 
box and paper under the hall door. 



He found some medical cotton and 
pushed that under; also a long un- 
sharpened pencil. He did the same 
with a long piece of string, to which 
at one end he had tied several paper 
clips. He took a piece of manu- 
script paper from the table; wrote 
some large words on it ; found some 
stamps and a razor blade — and 
pushed them under. Then he 
squeezed under himself and re- 
turned after nearly an hour. 

But then the sun had gone down, 
and he was exhausted again. He ate 
a little more of the mouse’s cheese, 
drank some more water from the 
cat’s saucer, and then lay down once 
more on the cushion and went to 
sleep. 

IT WAS pitch dark when Allison 
awoke. He got up at once, released 
the still-unconscious cat, drank all 
the water he could hold, and pushed 
out under the door. He could not 
be sure, but after reconnoitering the 
second-floor hall he came to the con- 
clusion that it was after midnight, 
and time for what he had in mind, 
so he returned to the hall door and 
dragged to the stairhead what he 
had secreted there. It was the 
tooth-powder box, now wrapped up, 
and, within, visible through one end, 
the corrugated pasteboard, cotton, 
razor blade, string with the clips, 
and the long unsharpened pencil. 

The coast seemed clear ; he pushed 
the box containing all this through 
the rungs of the bannister to the 
main-floor landing below, then fol- 
lowed down himself by way of the 
steps — sitting, turning over the 
edge, letting himself down by his 
arms and then dropping — all these 
eighteen times until he was at the 
bottom. 

There, he retrieved his box, filled 
it as before, and dragged it to the 
vestibule, where he cautiously sur- 



68 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



veyed the street. It was dark and 
obviously very late. Nothing 
stirred, except the occasional trucks 
and taxis far down the corner of 
First Avenue. Assured, he pushed 
the box and its contents off onto the 
broad top step, lowered himself 
there, then pushed it off the side to 
the pavement and again followed 
down. 

Fifteen minutes later, dragging 
his box laboriously behind him, he 
arrived at a letter box precisely half- 
way in the block toward Second 
Avenue; and that was his destina- 
tion. 

He proceeded to work with un- 
hesitating efficiency. First he took 
the pencil out of the box and laid 
it on the ground. Then he removed 
the string and tied its free end to 
the base of the letter box. After 
four tries he suceeded in casting the 
clip-tied end over the top of the 
letter box ; and when its weight had 
carried the string down on the other 
side climbed that string to the top. 

He sat there a moment — a bloody, 
bearded, six-inch gnome, still in his 
dirty white dress — and after he was 
rested rose, tied the string by its 
middle to the letter-drop door, and 
slid down one string to the ground. 

And now had his string tied at 
one end of the base of the letter 
box, a slack length leading from 
there up to the letter-drop knob, and 
the long loose clip end hanging free. 

He tied the tooth-powder box to 
this clip end. 

Next, he stuck the pencil, head 
high, in a loop he made in the string 
attached at both ends, and began, 
in the fashion of one tightening a 
tourniquet, to twist. He twisted it 
many scores of times, and when he 
had finished, the letter-drop door 
was held open. 

He rested a little, then once more 
climbed hand over hand to the top 



of the letter box. There, he rested 
again, then pulled up the tooth-pow- 
der box to position in the open 
mouth of the letter drop. And, that 
done, he got down in the mouth 
alongside his box, and took out the 
razor blade and cut both strings. 

The letter-drop door closed, and 
he and the little box fell down into 
the inside of the letter box. 

Fifteen minutes later he himself 
was in the little tooth-powder box, 
and it was closed, the outer paper 
gathered at the end and tied. 

He had mailed himself. How else 
was he to get to Doctor Heiler? 

THERE WAS no telling when 
Peyton would return; probably not 
for some time, from the window he 
had left open for the cat to get in 
and out by way of the fire escape. If 
Allison had waited, he might have 
starved, for he was none too sure 
that he would have been able to open 
one of those cans of beans, helpless 
and without tools as he was. 

It was better, anyway, that Pey- 
ton did not know. That would leave 
only Heiler. 

Snug in his cotton-padded box, 
Allison tried to sleep. Once more 
he was dog-tired. The acts that 
were casual nothings to normal peo- 
ple had required titanic energies on 
his part. He was lame all over, and 
his right arm, now that it was no 
longer being used, was beginning 
to ache intolerably. 

He thought back over the amazing 
events of the last twenty-four hours 
— Jones’ agent, whom he had left 
lying unconscious back on Forty- 
ninth Street — the heart-bursting dis- 
covery that he had been reduced to 
a pitiful toy— his colossal labors in 
getting to Doctor Heiler. He had 
performed feats that once he would 
have called impossible; but now the 
worst was over. His friend would 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



69 



take him in; would guard his se- 
cret; and would help him prepare 
a way to kill without possible fail- 
ure that traitor Jones when he 
shoi’i! call on him once more. 

It was good that Heiler lived just 
down the hall from him. He would 
have perfect protection, and yet be 
close to his own laboratory. 

Sleep came gradually, and when 
it did it was filled with the face of 
Jones, and a lovely girl, his own 
size, whom he would never see again, 
and two men who looked remarkably 
like himself — and always, ever re- 
turning, doll faces, rows of them, 
each one identical with himself, and 
each one somehow himself. 

He was rudely awakened by the 
shock of his plunge into the post- 
man’s bag, and knew, then, it must 
be morning. 

There was no sleep after that. He 
rode; was jolted; rested; was jolted, 
rode, and rested some more; and 
then was off in a carrier’s bag 
on the way to his own house. He 
could hear nothing, but could tell 
when he was being carried up the 
steps and given to the maid. She 
would now be carrying him up to his 
old friend Heiler. 

A pause, and he came to rest. 

Another pause, but Allison 
couldn’t wait. He pushed aside the 
string and paper at the top end of 
the box and looked out. He was 
on the desk in his own laboratory. 
Fearfully he continued out and 
looked around. 

His high-backed swivel chair 
pivoted ; a colossus was seated there. 
And the high-looming features of 
the colossus were those of the man 
called Jones. 

VIII. 

FOR A moment Allison 
crouched there, petrified. 

Then the great features above 



spread up in a smile, and that re- 
leased him, and in instant wild 
panic he was scrambling back over 
the surface of the desk looking for a 
way to get down. Jones’ hand came 
swooping through the air, but before 
it could close over him he had made 
one wild jump out beyond the edge 
of the table to the cord leading up 
to the reading lamp, had closed his 
arms about it and was sliding down 
its rough, wavy length. 

He was skinned and bleeding 
when he reached the floor, but at 
once he was away and looking for 
a place — any place — to escape into. 
Nothing near by offered. The desk 
was placed forty yards out from the 
wall, and far to one side, in the cor- 
ner, stood a high, heavy, specimen 
cabinet. If he could make that! 

The colossal feet under the desk 
were moving; Jones’ head and arm 
appeared into view above them. Al- 
lison seized his chance and ran with 
all his might over the hundred-yard 
open space to the cabinet. After 
him charged Jones; but he reached 
it safely and retired far under its 
base. Its height was such that he 
just had room to stand erect. 

He got out his hypodermic. He 
was cornered; but let Jones’ fingers 
come near enough and he was as 
good as dead! 

Heart beating like a frightened 
mouse, Allison waited. What would 
his enemy do? Get the broom and 
sweep him out? Then bat him to 
death as one would a cockroach? 

He watched the man’s feet. They 
lifted out of sight, lowered, slowly, 
one at a time; receded: he was re- 
turning to the desk. A pause, then 
the feet returned. Knees appeared, 
and hands; the man’s head showed. 
He was wearing over his head and 
mouth an apparatus not unlike that 
of a telephone operator. Then Alli- 
son heard words, the first since he 



70 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



had left the other’s civilization, 
weeks — it seemed years — before. 

The word-sounds were extremely at- 
tenuated ; he could not recognize 
them as belonging to Jones. 

“Come out, Allison,” they said. 
“I won’t hurt you.” 

“Come and get me!” the ethnol- 
ogist challenged, hoping fervently 
that he would reach in and try. 

“All right; but throw cut the 
hypodermic first,” came the long- 
drawn-out reply. 

“Like hell I will !” exclaimed Alli- 
son passionately. Jones knew! He 
was prepared! Despair seized him. 
He was lost. 

He waited to see what would hap- 
pen next. Jones wasted no more 
words, but returned to the desk and 
occupied himself there in a manner 
Allison could not see. Then he re- 
turned, and knelt down again. 

“All right, 372, if you will,” he 
said. 

What did these cryptic words 
mean? 

Allison waited, tense, far back 
under the cabinet. Jones’ cupped 
hands lowered near the front edge; 
one was removed; and off the other 
stepped a tiny man, his own size. 
He wore a soft-green robe and san- 
dals; was clean and freshly shaven; 
and in figure, face, and bearing he 
was another himself! 

He stepped under the front edge 
of the cabinet and looked around. 
Allison, amazed and frightened, cow- 
ered farther back. Jones’ face ap- 
peared at the floor, watching. 

“I say, Allison, how are you?” 
exclaimed the double, seeing the 
other and starting heartily over to 
him. 

“Who are you?” Allison asked 
fearfully, backing still more. The 
fellow had his own voice! 

“372.” The other laughed. 
“You’re 793 — though I know you 



aren’t av/are of it. But heavens, 
man — how you look!” 

Allison looked the wreck he was. 
His dresslike costume was torn and 
filthy; his arm was burned; his 
hands were skinned, swollen, raw, 
and bleeding; and on his face was 
a tangled, matted three-inch yellow 
beard. 

“Who are you?” Allison repeated, 
crouching, devouring him with 
bloodshot eyes, ready at a flash to 
run or strike, like a man cornered 
by his own ghost. 

“Come on out, old fellow, and I’ll 
explain,” said the double kindly. 
He made as if to grasp Allison’s 
upper arm. 

“If you touch me, you die!” 
growled the ethnologist intensely, 
avoiding his hand. 

Jones’ voice floated in. “Watch 
out! He has a hypodermic!” 

“Oh!” said the double and held 
himself with more caution. “Alli- 
son,” he said seriously to the other, 
“you’ve been a damn fool. We’re 
not here to hurt you. Come on out 
and ” 

“Go away!” Allison interrupted, 
crouching lower, a wild light in his 
eyes. “Go away ! Go away!” he re- 
peated shrilly, utter desperation in 
his voice. 

The double took a step back. “I 
think he is a little mad,” he said 
to Jones. 

The two men faced each other 
tensely. They were the same per- 
son, except that one stood erect, 
fresh, confident, and in full health 
and strength, and the other was 
bruised, battered, bloody, spent, and 
crouched like a cornered rat about 
to spring. 

“Give me that needle,” the double 
said. 

Allison’s head went a little lower. 
His lips drew back over his teeth 



0 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



71 



like an animal’s. Without warning 
he jumped and struck out. 

LIKE A mongoose dodging a 
cobra the double leaped back, and 
his own right arm flashed forth, 
caught the other’s by the wrist and 
held it. It was his fresh strength 
against the last reserves of the eth- 
nologist’s, and the balance was all 
for him. He twisted the wrist; the 
arm gave backward; and both fell to 
the floor, he on top. Carefully, still 
holding the wrist at the breaking 
point, he removed the sack and 
threw it out to Jones. Then he 
dragged his wildly threshing pris- 
oner out in the open. 

Jones was waiting to relieve him. 
Gently, so as to give no hurt, he 
enfolded Allison in one hand, took 
the double up in the other, and car- 
ried both over to the desk. There 
he placed the two on the blotter, 
ringed them with his hands, and sat 
down. 

Allison at once shied away from 
the double. 

“I admire you, 793,” Jones said. 
“But you’ve put me to an extraordi- 
nary amount of trouble.” 

The ethnologist turned and looked 
up at him. “And look what you’ve 
done to me!” he yelled back, pant- 
ing. “I accepted your offer in all 
good faith. I was to come to no 
harm. And the first thing I discov- 
ered was that I was just another 
victim whose mind you intended to 
pervert. Jones, you’re the sys- 
tem’s lowest, most treacherous 
skunk!” 

The out-worlder smiled a little; 
but Allison found it impossible to 
read his face when it was so big. 
The double at his side startled him, 
speaking up in defense 

“No, no — you’re all wrong! Let 
him explain.” 

“Explain how he kept his agree- 



ment by reducing me to this size?” 
Allison retorted bitterly. “Who are 
you, anyway?” 

“Tell him,” the double said to 
Jones. 

“Will you listen to what I have 
to say?” the out-worlder asked in 
his slow-creeping voice. 

“I don’t see that I have any 
choice,” Allison spat back. 

There was a pause. 

“I’ll have to start far in the past,” 
the colossus began at last. 

“Forty-five thousand years ago the 
human race was one, and lived only 
on Earth. One segment of that race, 
living on a great warm island in the 
South Pacific, developed a mighty 
civilization. You Earthmen of to- 
day who live in what you call the 
scientific age are but in the early 
groping stages of the civilization 
that was your forbears’ at that time. 

“Among other things, the human 
race had perfected space ships and 
ventured out into the void. It set 
up colonies on other planets, suit- 
able. And when the day predicted 
for centuries by its geologists came, 
and the great island that was its 
home began to sink under the sur- 
face of the sea, it was ready, and in 
thousands of space ships set forth, 
for some, out-world portions of the 
solar system, and the rest, to other 
and more stable parts of Earth. 

“There was but one blood. The 
Mutrantian Titans, who in your 
work under preparation will be held 
up as a cousin strain to that of 
Earthmen, are so in fact. They are 
the descendants of one colony of the 
Earthmen of forty-five thousand 
years ago. Their size resulted from 
local conditions which I need not 
go into. 

“I am of a race you would call 
pygmies; but we, for good reasons, 
deliberately reduced ourselves to 
that size. We have for a long time 



72 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



known how to do it. I, to attain 
my present size, for purposes of 
mixing among you Earthmen, 
simply underwent the reverse of the 
process. But I and my kind are of 
the human race. We are the de- 
scendants of another colony. 

“We have always been a small col- 
ony, for our environment did not 
encourage a great population. In 
time we were exposed to the dangers 
of inbreeding. We did the logical 
thing. Every so often we obtained 
from our brother colonies new stock, 
with varied and vigorous hereditary 
factors different from those in us. 
This new stock we scientifically in- 
filtrated through cur own; and so 
we kept the fecundity and the vigor 
of our strain ” 

“Jones,” interrupted Allison 
hotly, “you’re lower than a dog to 
have taken me, and others like me, 
for use as studs in the series of mat- 
ings which would be necessary for 
that result!” 

The out-worlder showed no anger. 
“There are no ‘series of matings,’ 
and won’t be,” he answered. “And 
you — Allison — were the only Earth- 
man we took.” 

“I have positive knowledge that 
you mated off other Earthmen while 
I was there,” contradicted the eth- 
nologist. 

“I know what you know,” the 
other said “Miss CB-301 voluntarily 
came and told me. But in spite of 
what you saw through the search- 
beam, you were the only Earthman 
concerned.” 

“You’re a liar!” Allison flung back. 

STILL the out-worlder showed no 
sign of anger. Patiently he went 
on: 

“You learned a little, but not 
enough. When you escaped it be- 
came necessary to follow and bring 
you back, for we could not have you 



disseminating false information, or 
indeed any. It was thought most 
expedient to take you upon your am 
rival here. To that end I arranged 
for the private grounding of my 
space ship, which you had appro- 
priated, and one of my men was 
there waiting. 

“You know what happened. You 
got away from him, and went I don’t 
know where. But it was certain that 
you would try to return to your 
home, so I came here and waited for 
you. And, naturally, your friend, 
Doctor Heiler, was watched, and 
your suspicious package brought in 
to me. 

“Now,” he concluded, “I am going 
to take you back.” 

“I prefer to be destroyed!” 

“You won’t, later.” 

“That’s the damnable part of it! 
What, then, will you do with me?” 
“I will hold you to your part of 
our agreement.” 

“Meaning, you’ll force me to 
marry a never-ending series of your 
disgusting females with the progna- 
thous foreheads — and like it.” 

“You will mate only with one.” 
“One is too many. I shall never 
arrive back there alive.” 

“You will be watched,” the colos- 
sus said significantly. He smiled a 
little. 

“It happens, though,” he went 
on, “that I have promised you to 
Miss CB-301. Would that be so 
painful? She loves you. If,” he 
added, “you could find it in your 
heart to love her, I think we might 
make an exception in your case and 
not force you by the means we 
have.” 

Allison was in the man’s power; 
why should he grant favors? He 
was skeptical. 

“Jones,” he said, “I don’t trust 
you and don’t believe you. My 
mating with that girl — or any one of 



A MATTER OF SIZE 



73 



your women, no matter how prolific 
she might be — would have no ef- 
fect whatever on the racial stock 
of a city like yours.” 

Jones smiled. “Doctor Allison 
has already mated with 1722 of our 
women,” he said. 

For a moment the ethnologist 
could not believe his ears. Then he 
dismissed the remark with an ex- 
pression of irritation. “You talk 
crazy!” he said. 

“Do you not know,” the out- 
worlder asked calmly, “that theoret- 
ically it is possible to divide in half 
the various molecules which make 
up an object and reassemble them 
to make two of that object, exactly 
like it, only smaller? Some day you 
Earthmen will learn to do it; but 
we can do it already. We can split 
objects into fifties, hundreds; we 
can do it with the living human 
body ! 

“Shortly after Doctor Allison had 
come to us, he, the original 178- 
pound Doctor Allison, was split up 
into 1723 little ones, each identical 
with the original except in the mat- 
ter of size. You are one of those lit- 
tle ones. Mr. 372, here, is another. 
You each weigh approximately one 
and a half ounces.” 

A great light burst over Allison’s 
mind. He saw again that fearful 
recurring image of the doll faces. 
Interminable rows of them. Each 
face his face, and every one some- 
how himself. 

They had been those doll faces! 
Sometime during the process he in 
the large size had become aware of 
the scene before him and had sub- 
consciously remembered. 

He gaped foolishly at the out- 
worlder. The new vista of possibili- 
ties which his words had opened up 
was overpowering. Jones smiled. 

“Yes,” he said, “1728 little ones, 



and 1722 are already mated witn 
our women. 

“I’m sorry,” he added, “but five 
died, for various reasons out of our 
control. When you all are eventu- 
ally recombined, Doctor Allison will 
weigh several ounces less. I don’t 
think he will mind, though, for he 
can more than make that up in one 
good meal.” 

Allison still stood as if turned to 
stone. The man really did seem 
to be telling the truth. He must have 
been sincere all along. 

“You will recall,” Jones went on, 
“that I promised Doctor Allison he 
would be returned here unharmed 
after four months. He will be. All 
your — well, brothers, now so happily 
married, will just before that time 
undergo the reverse of the process 
whereby we made them fall in love; 
and then all will be assembled. You 
will be one of them. I am in con- 
science bound to see that every one 
of his living partitions are present.” 

The colossal face smiled. “Of 
course, for all that desire it, there 
will be a suitable ceremony of di- 
vorce.” 

The smile faded. There was a 
pause. “Has it occurred to you,” 
Jones asked, “that I am reasoning 
with you, not just snatching you? 
On the face of it, I might be telling 
the truth.” 

Allison no longer doubted, but 
his thoughts were elsewhere. 1723 
matings! That many homes — angles 
— environments! All parts of him- 
self, later to be recombined into him- 
self ! 

“Think of the new knowledge!” 
Jones said. 

Was the man smiling? 

“Why hasn’t any one ever brought 
his knowledge back to Earth with 
him?” Allison asked with sudden 
sharp suspicion. 

“Before leaving, we removed it 



74 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



from their minds,” came the frank, 
easy answer. “We’ll of course do 
that with Doctor Allison too.” 

So! Well, if he ever had that 
knowledge in one person, he’d come 
back with it! Somehow! Some- 
how. 

He hesitated, still shaken, think- 
ing, a doll beside another doll on 
the great table over which leaned 
the colossus who had been his en- 
emy. He felt a touch on his arm. It 
was 372. 

“Don’t be deterred by thoughts of 
that ugly young atavism,” the fel- 
low said encouragingly. “They’ll 
get you some one more beautiful 
than she.” His face lighted up. 
“Personally, I’ve had the greatest of 
luck. I understand about the ma- 
chine; but deep down I know right 
well there’s something more than 
that between KS-971 and myself. 
It’s beyond words. Even to see her ! 
Her mouth! Her scalp — not a hair! 
Her high, wide, wrinkled forehead!” 



He’d been in the machine, all 
right. 

Allison still hesitated. So all his 
struggles had come to this! “Ser- 
vice.” “Applied, and very, very 
practical ethnology.” Yes; and one 
very, very widely applied eth- 
nologist. 

There was that lovely girl of the 
numbers. She loved him. Even 
Jones had said she loved him. He 
was bruised and weary; he needed 
very much to have some one lovely 
and kind and warm 

“After all, you don’t have any 
choice,” the out-worlder reminded 
him. 

793 shrugged. “Ail right,” he said 
with a sigh. “If you will agree to 
enlarge Miss CB-3Q1 to earth-size 
and permit her to return with me.” 

Jones smiled. “As you wish,” he 
said. He rose and picked up the two 
tiny men. He put them in a little 
box in his pdcket and walked out 
of the door. 



Next Month: 

The story of an incredibly changed Earth 

THE LONG NIGHT 

By CHARLES WILLARD DIFFIN 



— and a scientist who fought 

to change it back again! 

IN THE MAY 

ASTOUNDING STORIES 





The God Box 



by Howard Von Drey 

Illustrated by Charles Durant 



B iUT I AM not a locksmith,” 
said Thorn impatiently. “I 
have never made a key in my 
life. Why don’t you take this Chi- 
nese cabinet, or whatever it is, to 
one of these fellows in the street 



who does that sort of thing for his 
business?” 

“It’s too heavy to carry.” Pence 
smiled. 

“A box no larger than a camera?” 
said Thorn. 



76 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



“I told you,” said Pence, “that it 
was extremely heavy, though I 
didn’t say how heavy. The exact 
dimensions are four and three quar- 
ters by five and one half by seven 
inches. It weighs, I should judge, 
somewhat more than a ton.” 

Graham Thorn, who was a pretty 
good engineer and no fool, stared 
at the young man incredulously. 

“What I am getting at is this,” 
said Pence: “This job has me 

stopped. I can’t make head or tail 
of it, and I ought to know a great 
deal about such things. The box 
is heavily carved, but has no mov- 
able parts. Nothing like a lid, no 
keyholes. It reacts like gold, ex- 
cept for hardness, and sounds hol- 
low. I can’t imagine why such a 
container should weigh so much un- 
less there is something remarkable 
inside. I heard about you as an 
engineer with an unusual imagina- 
tion, and thought I could afford to 
pay you for opening it by some 
means of your own.” 

“What do you think this container 
is?” the engineer asked. 

“A battery.” 

“A battery!” Thorn’s feet came 
off the desk and banged on the floor. 
He pulled his chin thoughtfully, 
weighing possibilities more remote 
than a dream. Suddenly he rose. 

“Come,” he said, taking his coat 
and hat, and the two men left the 
laboratory. 

LIKE MANY wonderful curiosi- 
ties of the goldsmith’s art. Pence’s 
box had no history. No one could 
say anything more about it than 
Pence himself, and that was little. 
The earliest Egyptians certainly did 
not discover America, nor did they 
live in an ugly old residence on 
30th Street. Nevertheless, a lock- 
smith plied his trade there in what 
was little more than a hole in the 



wall, and there Pence had discov- 
ered the box. What attracted him 
were the fine, carved figures ; figures 
of an Egyptian character. 

Finding a thing so precious in 
this rubbish was odd enough, but 
there was something besides. The 
place was infested with cats; huge 
cats like small panthers. He 
watched the beasts while his key 
was being filed. One of them sniffed 
in the corner at this box, a lovely 
thing without a counterpart. All 
that the locksmith could say of it 
was that it was there, crated to the 
floor, when he moved in a dozen 
years ago. He seemed to be a little 
afraid of it. He had never suc- 
ceeded in opening it and thought it 
was welded shut. 

Such an object, so richly carved, 
could not be a mere arbitrary form. 
Somewhere, in whatever crypt or 
antique vale, it must have been 
worked for one particular purpose; 
which was probably contained in the 
book of Thoth. 

“I know considerable about such 
things,” said Pence, “on the side of 
archaeology. Beyond any doubt, 
aside from its arbitrary form, this 
work is earliest Egyptian. There’s 
no trace of conflict. 

“These knobs on top are royal 
heads, each different in one small 
particular which would probably 
net be apparent to you. These two 
on the side represent the head of 
Thoth — one is an ibis and the other 
a dog. There is no good reason for 
their being placed where they are — 
you can see they aren’t part of the 
design. I got to thinking of ter- 
minals — a battery.” 

Young Pence cocked his head in 
an odd way he had. “Listen!” he 
said sharply. “Do you hear any- 
thing?” 

Thorn squinted around the room. 



THE GOD BOX 



77 



puzzled. “That humming?” he 
asked. “What is it?” 

“The cats are coming,” said Pence. 
“I heard it in that shop. I think 
the sound comes from the box.” 

Pie walked to the window. 
“Look,” he said. 

Thorn joined him, and looked 
into the courtyard. A number of 
uncommonly large cats were prowl- 
ing about down there and glancing 
up at the window with yellow eyes. 
More were coming, one by one, over 
the wall. Thorn looked up. It was 
a gray day in- spring, with clouds 
overcasting the sky like a sheet of 
slate. 

He turned into the room again 
and without a word picked up a few 
tools Pence had been working with 
— knife, pliers, file. The gold box 
was tempered enormously, and the 
file dulled. 

Thorn looked inquiringly at 
young Pence, then cut a lamp cord. 
Pie looked closely at the two heads 
of Thoth and saw that the pupil of 
the right eye of each head was in 
reality a small hole. He inserted a 
bare wire in each hole and plugged 
the cord into the wall. There was 
a flash. 

He bent over the box. “There’s a 
connection here,” he said. 

Pence nodded. This thing was 
operated by electrical force. A 
thing out of olden times, engraved 
with forgotten characters, and it 
was controlled by the most power- 
ful tool of modern science! A cat 
screamed outside. 

IT WAS Pence who discovered 
the next step. He had been trying 
the heads on top of the box, and one 
of them gave, turning to the left. 
There was a smart click. Both 
looked, and saw that a square, 
carved plate had been withdrawn 
from the front of the box. They 



peered in through the aperture, at 
what was apparently a flat crystal. 
In this crystal were imprisoned 
myriads of phosphorescent parti- 
cles which seemed to have a motion 
of their own, endless and slow. 

Beyond the crystal was an impres- 
sion of wheels and queerly shaped 
ratchets;, miniature drums mounted 
eccentrically on their axles. The 
entire mechanism, what they could 
see of it, was foreign to their knowl- 
edge, but beautifully machined for 
some odd purpose. 

The knob Pence had turned un- 
locked all the others. The royal 
Egyptian heads that incrusted the 
top of the box were engraved with 
perplexing symbols, but though 
Pence could not hope to decipher 
them in their connection here, he 
guessed there was a definite purpose 
in the pattern of the heads, at least. 
A second knob yielded. 

Suddenly Thorn flapped his arms 
grotesquely and cried out, “My 
boy!” as though Pence had struck 
him. 

Darkness descended on them like 
a blow, and was so oppressive that 
Thorn groaned. The humming 
sound increased in volume till the 
room seemed to be spinning around 
them. Pence staggered to the win- 
dow and opened it. At once, the 
darkness which filled the room 
spilled through the window and fell 
into the courtyard in a well of 
shadow. The host of cats were 
drowned in it, and their fighting and 
crying ceased. 

There was light behind him. He 
turned and saw the engineer regard- 
ing a cube of light, some ten or 
twelve feet in dimensions, in the 
middle of the room. Thorn seemed 
to have recovered. 

“Mr. Pence! Mr. Pence!” he 
called. “I cannot believe this!” 

“What is it?” Pence asked. 



78 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



A chair and table had been there 
where the light was, but now even 
the rug on the floor ended where the 
cube of light touched it. 

“It is solid!” shouted Thorn. 
“You can feel it with your hands!” 

Pence was frightened. Solid 
darkness and solid light! This cube 
of light stopped Thorn’s hands as 
though it were made of glass. In it 
was nothing but its own thin bril- 
liance. It was an abyss, and he 
backed away from it. 

It came from the box, though 
there was n&- visible connection be- 
tween the two. If that were its 
source, it could be controlled. He 
had a crazy memory of having read 
somewhere that in the book of Thoth 
were powers that controlled light. 
Was it so, indeed? He warned the 
engineer of what he was going to do. 

“There are seventeen heads,” he 
said recklessly, “and we have tried 
only two.” 

Graham Thorn smiled. “I believe 
I can account for the weight of that 
box,” he said. “Did you observe 
the row of cylinders in the bottom 
of the box? Each connected in 
some way to the crystal or to the 
gears? I don’t know whether they 
are hollow or not, but I believe they 
contain power in some form, and a 
great deal of it. That light is a 
manifestation, and it is certainly 
not the kind of energy we are fa- 
miliar with. What do you suppose 
might happen if that force were re- 
leased all at once?” 

“I think we’d be blown to smith- 
ereens.” Pence grinned. 

“Very likely I’m an imaginative 
old jackass,” said the engineer, “but 
I think it would be something 
worse.” 

THORN did not specify what he 
meant. But the two men soon dis- 
covered they were tinkering blindly 



with a force of a peculiarly awful 
nature. At the same time there was 
a prankishness in their experiment- 
ing, as in the encounter that fol- 
lowed with Swane, an archaeologist, 
or “digger,” as he fondly called him- 
self. 

Russel Swane, who could speak 
several languages fluently and had 
seen practically everything on earth 
worth seeing, was crossing the 
African desert by motor. The sand 
in this section had a fair crust, but 
he had been traveling slowly, as 
itinerant diggers do. The right rear 
wheel broke through. 

“I will be a dirty so and so,” he 
said, by way of beginning. 

It would be a long, nervous job 
getting out, and a worse one getting 
up enough momentum to travel 
again. Whereupon he commenced 
swearing easily and rapidly, which 
he considered the best thing to do 
in such cases, and got out of the car. 

About fifty paces ahead, a twelve- 
foot cube of sand rose in the air, 
drifted sidewise, and dropped with 
a thump that fissured the entire 
stretch of crust he intended to 
travel across. 

“I say!” he shouted. “Damn it!” 

He dropped his shovel and board 
and strode angrily toward the pile 
of sand. Another perfect cube is- 
sued from the ground at his feet, 
and he scrambled away from it. It 
rose high in the air without drop- 
ping a single grain, and moved di- 
rectly over his head. He heard a 
droning sound like a single mon- 
strous bee, and knew this was some 
damned new kind of machinery, 
American-made, for excavating. 

“Ahoy!” he yelled, shaking his fist 
at the block of sand. “Ahoy! Ahoy! 
Heads up!” 

The cake of sand moved about 
uncertainly in the air, approached 
the hole it had occupied, and sank 



iTHE GOD BOX 



79 



back deliberately into the ground. 

“Ahoy!” said a clear voice. 
“Where are you?” 

Swane whirled about. A solid 
block of intense light stood on the 
ground near by. 

“Here!” he said sharply. “What 
is this?” 

“Sorry, old man,” said the voice 
apologetically, “didn’t know you 
were about. Can we help you?” 
“You can,” said Swane belliger- 
ently, as the light enveloped him. 
“You busted my crust, and you can 
tell me how I’m going to get my car 
out of here.” 

“Where is the car?” 

“Down there.” 

Even as Swane pointed he felt 
himself lifted in the air and de- 
posited easily by the side of the car. 
He heard the voice say: 

“Does it fit?” 

“Just,” a new voice added. 

The car shifted in the sand. 

“Get in,” Swane was commanded. 
“Where do you want to go?” 

“Cape Town. I forgot my watch.” 
There was a moment of silence. 
“Really?” the voice asked. 

“No!” said Swane angrily. “My 
digging is thirty kilometers ahead, 
and now I’m not going to make it.” 
The car left the ground and was 
rapidly carried forward. 

“When you see the digging, let 
us know,” said the voice. 

As the rippled dunes passed be- 
low him, Swane heard several in- 
comprehensible remarks. One of 
the voices said: 

“Gift horses, and all that, but this 
thing ought to have a bigger focus.” 
The other voice agreed. Then: 
“What puzzles me, now that we 
have tried all heads, is the fact that 
we have no finder. Why, a kodak 
has a finder, of a sort! Do you sup- 
pose two heads work together — say 
nine and eleven?” 



“Possibly.” 

“So, they do! In that case, thir- 
teen and eleven would give this dig- 
ger a look at us?” 

“It may be. That must be his des- 
tination, by the way.” 

“Is that your digging?” asked the 
younger voice. 

“Yes,” gasped Swane, and was un- 
ceremoniously dumped on the des- 
ert with an experience he never 
fully believed himself. 

“WHEN I think of what we have 
in this god box!” said Pence. “Why, 
there is no privacy on earth any 
more!” 

“Never do that which needs to be 
concealed,” said Thorn, smiling. 

“We’ve looked into the bowels of 
the earth, and seen the ruined fanes 
off the dolphin ridge. Here we are 
in New York, and yet we can step 
into that cube of light — hard at first, 
wasn’t it? — and find ourselves in 
Yucatan, if we’re focused there. 
What’s to prevent us from looking 
around the Moon?” 

“Nothing,” said Thorn. 

“Mars, Jupiter, the Milky Way?” 
“Nothing.” 

“Beyond that? The stars we can’t 
see? The worlds out there in the 
black?” 

“Nothing.” 

“What,” said Pence, “do you sup- 
pose we’d find, in the end, if we 
went far enough?” 

“I don’t think you would find any- 
thing out there,” said Thorn quickly. 
“You would not find God.” 

That was the trouble with Thorn. 
He was forever expressing some 
thought like that when life was 
at its highest. Anyhow, what was 
the good of Graham Thorn now? 
He had served his purpose, acciden- 
tal as it was. Pence could have had 
the machine entirely to himself. 
Thorn knew too much, and he might 



80 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



possibly speak of the machine to 
strangers. Graham Thorn was a 
menace. 

In the early days of experiment- 
ing, it was Pence who discovered 
the various powers of the machine, 
which he affectionately called his 
“long-legged camera” or “the Eye 
of Thoth.” He found what heads 
served a simple three-dimensional 
function or controlled motion. 
“King 17” was a deadly weapon of 
vengeance. When there was a self- 
reciprocal action between two or 
more heads, both Pence and the sub- 
ject he was shooting were visible to 
each other as solid, living objects. 
He could enter the cube of focus 
himself, and the subject could leave 
it and enter the room from, say, the 
streets of Bombay. 

But when “King 17” was turned, 
that subject — camel, deep-sea fish, 
or man — was “crushed with dark- 
ness.” Pence had thus “blacked 
out” a giant squid and part of the 
whale it was fighting with. When 
he released this blackness the squid 
and the snout of the whale exploded 
in a smother of foam. This was 
after he found how to increase the 
focus two and three times over. 

Outside the original cube, how- 
ever, no object had any reality nor 
substance beyond visibility. He 
could follow an eagle in the sky, and 
throw a stone through the eagle. 
But as soon as the bird passed 
through the twelve-foot cube, it be- 
came a solid object. 

Murder by proxy, wholesale 
theft, every crime on the calendar 
was within the reach of the long 
arm of Thoth, and divine justice as 
well. Pence became a little arro- 
gant with his increasing mastery of 
the camera, as was only natural. 
But Thorn frowned a little when 
Pence met him at the door dressed 
in the robes of Egyptian priesthood 



and holding the tau; and he frowned 
more at the stink of some antique 
temple incense filched from deep 
in the African sand. 

Worst of all, Pence had saved a 
huge “European black” from the 
hands of tribal enemies in the north 
African jungle, and this oily colos- 
sus, of royal black lineage, was 
Pence’s slave. 

The prankishness increased. A 
liquor ship in the north Atlantic 
was nearing the American coast. 
The skipper was standing at the rail 
of his vessel, smoking. This man’s 
name was Ganning, and he was a 
hard-headed, blond-whiskered in- 
dividual who was not himself given 
to drinking. The sea was so quiet 
that his own vessel seemed to be 
sliding through dirty green glass. 
A small, chunky sailing vessel stood 
off side without a ripple, and two 
men in ducks sat in her stern, yawn- 
ing or coiling a small rope. 

Ganning swore vehemently that 
he had seen a man dressed in a long 
white skirt appear in mid-air above 
the bow of this vessel, and holding 
a funny kind of gold-headed cane. 
Pence in his robes, with the tau. 
The next thing he knew, the sail- 
boat creaked from stem to stern, 
and leaped straight up into the air 
as though a whale had boosted it 
from underneath. The two men in 
ducks sprawled on their small deck, 
and one of them yelled, rather 
pointlessly : 

“Man overboard!” 

This boat disappeared. An in- 
stant later, before Ganning realized 
he had lost a good pipe in the water, 
another boat appeared in mid-air and 
floated down to the water like a big 
feather. It was a freaky little hull, 
not like the first in any particular, 
and full of gibbering little men 
talking something like Italian. 

Ganning was quite right. The 

AST— 5 



THE GOD BOX 



81 



harbor authorities wanted to know 
how a fishing boat from the bay of 
Naples could have arrived at the 
port of New York without being 
seen in transit, let alone weather- 
ing the ocean. Ganning never read 
a paper himself, or he would have 
found point in a simultaneous re- 
port of two Americans, both ap- 
parently insane, who had showed up 
in their sailboat, on a perfectly calm 
day, in the bay of Naples. 

THIS “wingless angel in a white 
skirt,” with or without the long 
cane, appeared in three reports. A 
certain actress, foreign born and 
thus subject to the folk-tale beliefs 
of her people, was awakened one 
night in a suburb of Los Angeles by 
a brilliant light all around her. Into 
this light stepped a very handsome 
incubus clad in a white dress orna- 
mented with gold thread and 
jewels. 

Her mother — whose English vo- 
cabulary consisted of “Yes,” “No,” 
and “How much?” — slept in an ad- 
joining room and awakened also. 
She was a very agile old woman, 
and immediately skipped through 
the hall in her nightdress when she 
heard a rumpus in her daughter’s 
bed. A cloud of black stuff was 
rolling out of the bedroom, and bil- 
lowed around her naked ankles, im- 
prisoning her. She heard a calm, 
arrogant voice say these mysterious 
English words: 

“Pride goeth before a fall. What’s 
more, all is vanity.” 

Then she was released; she found 
the room empty of Americans when 
she turned on the lights. Her 
daughter, almost unrecognizable, 
v/as sitting up in bed with an ex- 
pression of surprise and disappoint- 
ment on her face. Her head, which 
one could now see was shaped some- 
thing like a cue ball, was cropped 

AST-6 



to the scalp, and her extravagant 
platinum tresses were strewn all 
over the room. 

Shortly after this, an unpublished 
and profane account of James Gro- 
gan Torres, a soldier of fortune, de- 
scribed this angel in greater detail. 
Torres, who had found that the 
most profitable insurrections were 
those under already satisfactory 
governments, was leading his ex- 
pedition for gain down on a certain 
South American city when he saw 
a solid block of what he thought 
was white-hot metal leave the city 
and advance along the road toward 
him. He concealed himself at once. 
His army of three hundred, de- 
ployed along the hills, stopped their 
advance and commenced chattering 
with excitement at this phe- 
nomenon. 

There came into view, behind this 
cube, a white angel with a wand, 
who pointed at the army from a 
point not ten feet from Torres, said 
“Death!” and disappeared. This 
shining cube then began to plow 
the men into the earth amid agon- 
ized screams. Three besides Torres 
escaped death or mangling. The 
hill was very fertile that year. 

Pence never fully understood the 
working of the camera. Thorn 
could have given a great deal of in- 
formation if we were asked for it, 
but Pence was increasingly inde- 
pendent. Even Thorn had no knowl- 
edge of the nature of the force 
which some time-forgotten wizard 
had harnessed; but it showed a 
singularity of nature which was re- 
ferred to in at least three ancient 
literatures as “god,” and the learned 
deities of fable, and others, most 
certainly had traffic with it. 

In its various forms it explained, 
if it did not excuse, certain well- 
known miracles. Barring accidents, 
there was no reason why Pence, a 



82 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



mere archaeologist interested in the 
origins of Egyptian culture, could 
not have acquired considerable 
power, and, in fact, come near mak- 
ing himself a god, if he had any 
such purpose in mind. 

But he was as much interested in 
what people contrived the camera 
as in using it, and his attention, by 
his training, was diverted to that 
end. He dimly guessed at a people 
long vanished, ingenious beyond be- 
lief, but found it difficult to account 
for their unrecorded passing, and, 
indeed, for the existence of the cam- 
era itself. 

There were more cats than ever. 
M’Gwallah, the African servant, 
closed every hole in the old house 
that might admit a rat, but as fast 
as Pence got rid of them he would 
appear, spread his black arms with 
imperial magnificence, and say 
apologetically: 

“Cats.” 

There was something in the dron- 
ing, snoring sound of the camera 
that attracted them, and that was 
puzzling. It seemed ridiculous to 
suppose that the cat family had a 
generic memory of that sound. The 
cat once held the distinction of 
being a venerated beast, but so had 
other animals. 

Pence took the simplest method 
of disposing of them. M’Gwallah 
would throw chicken, freshly 
roasted, into the cube, and Pence 
would transport them abroad when 
the cube was full; load after load. 

The captain of a transatlantic 
liner was considerably disconcerted 
when several dozen nondescript cats 
suddenly appeared in his cabin "in 
mid-ocean, eating chicken. Pence 
estimated that he had transported 
more than five thousand of the 
beasts altogether. 

Nevertheless, they found ways of 
entering, and removing them was a 



daily nuisance. When the machine 
droned they would appear, and the 
worst of it was, it would occasion- 
ally sound when the camera was not 
in use. It was affected by mild 
electricaK disturbances of the 
atmosphere. 

ONE NIGHT Pence decided that 
Thorn must be done away with. He 
approached Thorn’s room with the 
dark focus and found him asleep. 
This room was fitted up like a power 
plant, and the man lay sound asleep 
on a studio couch in the midst of 
apparatus. To Pence’s surprise, for 
he thought the engineer might have 
appreciated dying in his sleep, 
Thorn said: 

“I have been waiting for you.” 

Pence brightened the focus at 
once. “You knew I was coming?” 
he asked. 

“Not at all,” said Thorn, sitting 
up. “It was a trick. I have trained 
myself to say that in my sleep, for 
at least a month. I thought we were 
getting pretty close to the end. Are 
you— going to kill me?” 

Pence felt disconcerted and very 
much ashamed. Hesitating a mo- 
ment, he turned a head on the god 
box and stepped into the focus him- 
self. As he did so, both he and 
Thorn were aware again of the mys- 
terious attraction they felt toward 
the camera. A subtle pull existed 
between the shining cube they were 
in and the box. 

“I’m sorry,” Pence said, holding 
out his hand. 

“That’s quite all right,” said 
Thorn. “You see, I don’t think 
your camera will work in this room, 
and I want to live out my normal 
span of years, anyhow.” 

“It won’t work? Why not?” 
Pence’s flesh tingled, as did Thorn’s. 
There was an unusual tension in the 
air. Ghostly fires chased over their 



THE GOD BOX 



83 



bodies in phosphorescent ripples, 
and the hair of their arms and heads 
bristled. 

“I’ve had the idea,” Thorn ex- 
plained, “that whatever force is im- 
prisoned in that box is only related 
to electricity as we know it. That’s 
obvious. But a common house cur- 
rent sets the camera working. I 
repeat, I am just an old fool, but I 
have a few ideas. Do you see all 
this apparatus? Well, this bed is in 
the middle of a field of resistance 
that ought to prove very trouble- 
some for your god box. I have a 
supply of current here large enough 
to create a sizable lightning bolt, 
and the more force you used the 
more current it would meet. The 
camera mechanism would weld. 

“By the by, haven’t you found any 
way of keeping those monsters of 
yours outdoors?” 

It was true; the cats appeared in 
ever-increasing numbers. Pence 
watched the animals filing through 
the open door of his room, which 
they could see beyond the camera 
from Thorn’s laboratory. The beasts 
slunk around the camera stand as 
though they were in search of prey. 

Momentarily the two men heard 
the rumble of M’Gwallah’s bass, and 
the great black appeared in the 
doorway. He glowered at the cats, 
which now numbered more than a 
dozen, and began to stalk them. One 
of the animals leaped up on the ta- 
ble, glared into the crystal, and 
leisurely assumed a position on top 
of the royal Egyptian heads. 

“M’Gwallah!” Pence shouted. 

The surprised black looked up. 

“For the love of God, Pence!” 
Thorn said. “Don’t move!” 

Thorn was sitting where he 
looked into the camera’s eye, and he 
could see something Pence could 
not. It was the first time either 
man had looked into the lens from 



the cube. The crystal, curiously, 
seemed to be increasing in size, and 
behind it was not the mere jumble 
of wheels there should have been. 

The cat had leaped off the camera 
meanwhile, which was what Thorn 
had hoped to prevent. It was too 
late now. For the cat had disturbed 
the position of the heads. 

“Pence! Pence!” whispered 
Thorn. “Come down here and 
look!” 

The sound of the camera increased 
to a great booming drone. The 
camera, on its stand, approached the 
cube of light which was its focus, 
met the cube with a shivering sound 
of metal, and vanished. They could 
still see M’Gwallah off in the shad- 
ows, a cat screaming under each arm 
-—great fighting cats that were rak- 
ing his glistening black hide with 
their steel claws. 

The cube of light was so charged 
with cross currents of force that 
their flesh stung. Pence and Thorn 
looked around the room, amazed. 
Graham Thorn gasped with realiza- 
tion, then screamed: 

“God help us! Pence! We are in- 
side the camera!” 

TKEIR surroundings changed. 
They were on a sandy beach, and 
saw to the left a mighty building 
fronted by countless steps in ter- 
races. It was of red stone, and of 
unrecognizable architecture. They 
saw a scintillating blue sea, and at 
perhaps a thousand yards distance 
a towering, brightly painted galley 
at anchor. Red-skinned men and 
women, clad in a kind of shimmer- 
ing, easily draping cotton when they 
were clad at all, stood about them, 
and eyed them incuriously, smiling. 
Large cats, or beasts of that family, 
wandered about freely and seemed 
to be held in high esteem. 

“Egypt?” whispered Thorn. 



84 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Pence shook his head. “Don’t 
you see?” he said. “There are two 
suns in that sky. That’s a western 
ocean.” 

Meanwhile a small boat was near- 
ing shore, in which stood erect a 
Negro holding a plate covered with 
a red cloth. On it was a golden box 
having the general appearance of 
the camera Pence had found at the 
locksmith’s. And behind them, be- 
hind Pence and Thorn, a black 
shadow had been moving up across 
that plane of the cube of focus. It 
was the shutter. 

Pence stood up, terribly afraid 
and glaring sightlessly. The camera 
was nowhere to be seen. 

“M’Gwallah!” he. screamed. 

He could still see the Negro. The 
red people frowned at him and ut- 
tered blurred, musical words of 
protest in their own language. 
“M’Gwallah! M’Gwallah!” He 
made twisting motions with his 
hands, as though he were turning 
the royal Egyptian heads. 

The African giant, totally dum- 
founded, stood there like a black 
shadow. The cats shrieked and 
fought against his fixed arms, un- 
heeded. He muttered anxious 
sounds, shifted his bare feet uncer- 
tainly. 

The small boat they had seen 
touched shore, and the Negro carry- 
ing the box stepped pompously on 
the sand. Pence pointed violently 
at the spot where his camera should 
have been and made gestures as 
though he were pushing the camera 
over. M’Gwallah still did not un- 
derstand. Pence hurled himself for- 
ward, and his body met the shining 
wall of the cube with a thud. 

M’Gwallah strode forward and 
seemed to be busy with some invis- 
ible object. His mighty back arched 
and cracked as he strode to move a 



ton or more of metal, the camera 
they could no longer see. Suddenly 
he sprawled into the cube of light 
himself. The black shadow crossed 
the cube behind them with a crash 
like cataclysm. 

AT THE same instant, the walls 
of the Manhattan residence of an 
archaeologist named Paul Pence col- 
lapsed inward as the result of a ver- 
tical explosion of unknown nature. 
This man Pence could not be found, 
nor could his friend Graham Thorn 
who disappeared at the same time, 
and who had been well liked in local 
scientific circles. Another phenom- 
enon occurred at about this time 
also, no one having heard the explo- 
sion. 

Quite a number of persons, con- 
sidering the average New Yorker 
as a rather unobservant individual, 
saw the rocket go off. This rocket 
was of a singular shape, being that 
of a box kite, or cube of about 
twelve feet in dimensions. It was 
reported by several loose-witted per- 
sons, too, that though this rocket 
was blinding in its brilliance, there 
still could be seen in it the figures 
of three men, one of them a Negro. 
A statement wholly untenable, since 
authorities had no knowledge of any 
persons working on passenger rock- 
ets at this time, and particularly not 
of this shape. 

Nevertheless, the cube had a mete- 
oric course, brilliant, instant, and 
free; and if any astronomer were 
observing it, he would have said it 
was pursuing a mathematically di- 
rect line for a point a fraction of a 
degree off the north star Vega. To- 
ward that certain planet, in fact, 
which the imaginative tribe of as- 
tronomers count as one able to sup- 
port life as on earth. 



The 

Atom- 

Smasher 

by Donald Wandrei 

Illustrated by C. R. Thomson 

I N THE laboratory that night 
there were only the six of us: 
Schonheim, his face pale and 
his black eyes glittering nervously 
as he prepared to demonstrate the 
invention on which he had labored 
so long; the three scientists, Jansa, 
Carlson, and Zollter, who were the 
judges; John Warburton, the old 
millionaire and industrialist, spon- 
sor of a standing prize to the first 
person who accomplished wireless 
transmission of matter; and myself, 
Warburton’s public relations coun- 
sel. 

We were grouped around a great 
machine whose vapor tubes and elec- 
trodes and network of metal parts 
made it a triumph of electrical gen- 
ius. Already it roared with power. 
A transmission cable was ready to 
feed it a twenty-million-volt current. 

Thirty feet from the machine was 
a smaller one, composed solely of 
thousands of fine wires adjustable to 
form an electro-magnetic field of 
any desired shape. 

Schonheim seemed almost disin- 
terested. Only his feverish eyes be- 
trayed his excitement. “Gentlemen, 
the principle is simple, though the 
equipment is necessarily complex. 
All my data and records are con- 
tained in those books.” He pointed 




to a sheaf of papers and diaries lying 
on a table. “We will examine them 
after my demonstration, and I will 
then explain my work in detail. At 
present, I will merely give you a 
general outline. Will that be agree- 
able?” 

“Perfectly,” said Warburton. “A 
convincing demonstration now will 
prove whether your claim is valid or 
whether we may leave without wast- 
ing more time on a failure.” 

Schonheim indicated a piece of 
metal opposite the great tube. Be- 
yond the metal lay a small platform. 
“When I turn on the current,” he ex- 
plained, “a twenty-million-volt 
charge bombards that piece of car- 
borium and drives off its neutrons at 
high speed into the article which 
lies on the platform. The neutrons 
beccme atom-smashers. The stream 
at prodigious velocity disrupts the 
atomic unity of the article and 
causes it to disappear. What hap- 
pens is that the atoms pour away in 
the direction of bombardment. 

“Presumably they would disperse 
throughout space, except for the re- 
integration apparatus. That is 
simply an electro-magnetic field of 
the exact shape of the article and 
held at extremely high tension un- 
der a current equal to or greater 






ASTOUNDING STORIES 



86 

than the original charge. The 
streaming atoms are captured by the 
field. If the field is larger than the 
original article, the reintegrated 
article will also be larger but of the 
same mass as before; if the field is 
smaller, the article will likewise be 
smaller but of smaller mass. 

“In other words, part of its mass 
would disperse through space. To 
all appearances, when the experi- 
ment is performed, the article will 
vanish from the platform and simul- 
taneously appear thirty feet away in 
the electro-magnetic field.” 

He walked over to the receiving 
machine and carefully adjusted its 
field to conform with a large, pyra- 
midal block of cork that he carried. 
Then he returned and allowed each 
of us to handle the piece. “I chose 
this material and shape,” he an- 
nounced, “because it has many small 
indentations which prevent it from 
being a perfect pyramid, to which 
the field is adjusted. There the cork 
will re-form as cork, but of absolute 
symmetry, the slight change in its 
appearance proving that no trickery 
or substitution is used.” 

“One question,” Warburton inter- 
rupted. “Does the machine work on 
fluids as well as solids, and on arti- 
cles composed of several different 
materials, and on organisms as well 
as inanimate objects?” 

“That I do not know. I have con- 
fined my work to perfecting the 
transmission of a simple, inanimate 
object.” 

“I see. It makes no difference in 
the prize, of course, which was and 
is offered for successful wireless 
transmission of any object.” 

Schonheim took the cork and 
asked: “Shall I begin?” 

We nodded assent and stood back. 



A hush of intense expectancy set- 
tled over us. We were about to wit- 
ness one of the great scientific 
achievements of all time, with vast 
potentialities in transportation, in- 
dustry, and power. The white light 
overhead shone with searching bril- 
liance on our faces, on the two ma- 
chines, and on the quantity of sup- 
plies and equipment strewn around 
the laboratory. 

Schonheim walked to the trans- 
mitter. He balanced the cork on the 
platform and stepped away. He 
must have thought it was not quite 
centered, for the atom-smasher 
moved to step forward again. 

I shall never know what happened. 
All our eyes were fastened on the 
cork. I think Schonheim tripped on 
the rug, or he might possibly have 
had a heart attack from his excite- 
ment. He fell against the cork, 
knocking it off. I saw his hands 
clutch for support at the machine. 
A switch was knocked shut. I was 
about to spring to his aid when a 
flame roared from the tube and smote 
the carborium with a noise like a 
thousand thunders. 

Schonheim screamed. Around his 
body, horribly rigid for an instant, a 
haze gathered, and he vanished. 
Even to my hyper-active senses it 
all happened in a moment. 

There was a dreadful silence save 
for a new sound, a dull drip, drip, 
drip. 

Warburton suddenly wrenched his 
eyes from the machine. He pressed 
his hands to his eyes and stumbled 
toward the door with a wordless cry. 

I looked toward the reintegrator 
where he had glanced. There, be- 
neath the reception field, lay a dark 
and bloody substance like a pudding, 
spreading slowly across the floor. 




The TOOTH by Neil Moran 

Illustrated by Charles Durant 

T HE OLD SCIENTIST looked “I don’t see what you can do, 
at the girl kindly. Lois,” said the scientist. “Bob is a 

“You love him very much, strange man. But you might go 
my dear, don’t you?” he said. there with me this evening. He has 

“Yes. And I think he loves me. an appointment with me to draw my 
But he isn’t aware of it, Doctor tooth.” 

Radley. What shall I do?” “Why should I come?” asked Lois. 



The chief 
raised the 
club — Garney 
tensed 



88 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



“Well, I have the feeling that 
something extraordinary might hap- 
pen,” said the old scientist mysteri- 
ously. “Maybe Bob will realize 
that he’s in love.” 

Whatever Doctor Radley meant 
by that, Lois didn’t know, but she 
knew that he was an extraordinary 
man. An old friend of her dead fa- 
ther, he was both adviser and con- 
fidant, to whom she had told many 
things. 

As he sat in his swivel chair after 
she left him, there was a smile on his 
face. 

He got up, moving across the li- 
brary floor in his slippers, stopping 
before a row of books. He picked 
up one and ran his fingers idly 
through it. Then he read. 

For twenty-five minutes he read, 
and then, putting the book aside, he 
got up and chuckled. 

That evening, as he and Lois Lane 
stepped into the waiting room, Gar- 
ney came out of his office and looked 
in. 

“Be right with you, doctor,” he 
said. “Oh, hello, Lois ! I didn’t 
know you were here.” 

“Well, I am,” she said, smiling at 
him. “Doctor Radley thought I 
should hold his hand.” 

“He doesn’t need any one to hold 
his hand,” said Garney. “It won’t 
hurt — not much,” he added. “You 
know, doctor, that tooth must come 
out.” 

“So you said, so you said,” said 
Radley, shaking his head. “I’ve got 
a very funny feeling about all this, 
doctor.” 

“How?” 

“Well, I’ll tell you when you’re 
ready. And don’t think I’m crazy!” 

Garney went back to his office 
thinking that the old man was just 
talking again. He liked Radley, 
knew him to be an odd sort. A bril- 
liant man, a scientist honored here 



and abroad, he was given to telling 
highly exaggerated stories. 

But then, Garney didn’t know all 
the things that Doctor Radley knew. 
Garney, for instance, had never been 
in India. Doctor Radley had. There 
he had learned the art of the fakir, 
and now he himself could do ex- 
traordinary things. But he never 
did them for his friends. He spoke 
of what he had seen, often causing 
incredulity that occasionally turned 
into mirth. 

Now, as he sat in a chair with Lois 
opposite him, he looked straight into 
her eye. One eye. Her right eye. 
He stared at it until she smiled. 

“Am I all right?” she said. “Or 
does the doctor see something 
wrong?” 

“You’re all right, my dear. Per- 
fectly all right. But stare at that 
light, Lois.” 

“Why?” 

“Just stare at it,” he said. 

She did, wondering what he was 
up to; but then, of course, Doctor 
Radley was an odd man. 

“Is some goblin going to come out 
of it and frighten me?” she said. 

“Not a goblin. You don’t believe 
in goblins, my dear. But stare at 
the light.” 

She continued to do so, laughing, 
as if it were a joke. Then suddenly 
Radley got up and walked over to 
her. He looked down. 

“Lois,” he said. “Look up at me.” 

She did. There was something in 
his eyes that at first startled her, 
then left her limp. 

“Lois,” he said, “don’t be afraid, 
my dear. I am simply putting you 
under my will. Now, Lois, I want 
you to get up and walk with me 
into the adjoining room. I want 
you to sit in a chair and be very 
quiet. Presently Robert and I will 
come in. And then, my dear, you 



THE TOOTH 



89 



shall experience something very 
wonderful.” 

Willingly, she was led from the 
room. 

The old scientist was looking 
through a magazine, whistling in an 
undertone, as Garney came in. 
“Where’s Lois?” he asked. 

“She went in the adjoining room,” 
said Radley. 

“Why did she go there?” 

“I don’t know. She said she 
wanted to go in and sit down.” 

“I can’t understand that girl,” said 
Garney. “Do you know, doctor, 

sometimes I think she’s ” 

“Oh, come, come now, Robert,” 
said the old scientist. “You know 
you like her, man.” 

“Of course I like her. But why 
did she go in there?” 

“Just to sit down.” 

“But it’s such a dismal room.” 
“Well, maybe she wanted to be 
dismal.” 

Radley got up. He tossed the 
magazine aside, patted the dentist 
on the shoulder, and followed him 
out. 

“Now, Robert,” he said, as he sat 
in the chair, “you’re not going to 
hurt me, are you?” 

“It will be over in a jiffy. You 
won’t know it’s out.” 

“All you dentists are optimists,” 
said the old scientist, “and cheerful 
liars, too. Now you know very well 
that ” 

“But it won’t hurt you, doctor. 
I’ll give you novocain. Of course, 
if you want gas, you won't even 
know that you’re here. How about 
gas and perhaps a pleasant dream?” 
“No; I’ve had my dream,” said 
Radley. He swung around. “Rob- 
ert” — he clutched the dentist’s hand 
-—“it was this dream that made me 
look up something in a book to-day. 
I’ve had a premonition, Robert. I 
want to see now if it’s true. I’m 



extremely anxious to see this tooth.” 

“You’ll see it, all right,” said Gar- 
ney, getting things ready. “W T hat 
is this? One of your old lines?” 

“What is what?” 

“This talk about the tooth.” 

“Oh, that,” said Radley, and he 
chuckled. “Well, wait until you 
see. And you’ll be telling me that 
I’m crazy, my boy.” 

Garney laughed and set to work. 
He didn’t mind Radley. Let him 
rave. Radley would always have his 
little joke. But, as the dentist tried 
to extract that tooth, something 
passed over him. 

Maybe he imagined it, but it 
seemed that his being vibrated from 
head to feet. 

“This is a tough one,” he mut- 
tered. 

“I told you ” gurgled Radley. 

“Don’t talk, doctor. Now!” 

At last, the tooth came with a 
strong pull. Garney told the scien- 
tist to rinse his mouth. 

“This is a beauty,” he said. “Look 
at it! Ugly as the devil, and the 

abscesses there were What is 

it, doctor?” 

“Let me see that tooth,” said Rad- 
ley. 

He got up. He took the tooth, 
held it up and swung around. 

“Now, Robert,” he said, “the some- 
thing extraordinary has happened. 
I want you to come into the waiting 
room.” 

Now this, Garney felt, was going 
too far. The scientist couldn’t tell 
him anything about teeth. Nothing 
extraordinary had happened, for 
Garney had seen and examined such 
teeth before. But the old scientist 
was so mysterious this evening — 
more than he usually was — that 
Garney followed him into the room, 
ready to tell him to drop the pose. 
Then he stopped. 



90 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Radley was looking at him with 
piercing eyes. 

“Sit down, Robert,” he said. 
“You’ll think I’m crazy, of course. 
But remember, Columbus was called 
insane and other men were called 
insane who later proved that they 
were not. Now look at that light.” 

Garney looked. 

“Do you see anything unusual 
about that light?” 

“Nothing.” 

But Garney was beginning to feel 
uneasy. 

“Well, listen, then, Robert.” The 
scientist stepped across. His voice 
was low. “Look up at me, Robert.” 
He might have been talking to a 
baby. Garney looked. 

“Now, Robert, my will is stronger 
than yours, and you’re under my 
will. You feel drowsy, don’t you? 
Your mind .is a blank.” Radley 
passed his hand across the dentist’s 
head. “There, my boy; now I’ll tell 
you what I want you to do. Walk 
into that room where Lois is. Sit 
in a chair. I’ll follow you. And 
then I’ll tell you the story about the 
tooth.” 

Garney got up, followed direc- 
tions; and the girl, sitting in a room 
with only one light burning, didn’t 
even know they came in. 

“Ah, it is pleasant in here,” said 
Radley. “Dismal, but pleasant 
nevertheless. At least, that’s how 
I find it. Paradoxical, to be sure. 

But then- Sit down, Robert. 

You see Lois, don’t you? This is 
Robert, Lois. Now look at each 
other. And then I want you both 
to lean over and see what I have 
here.” 

As if they were automatons, they 
bent over and stared. The room 
seemed to be growing darker. The 
atmosphere was close. There was 
now something that passed over 
Radley, for he looked quickly 



around. He had a tooth in his hand, 
a tooth that had been in his mouth 
for many years, a tooth that had 
slowly decayed. But now the tooth 
seemed to burn his fingers. He 
didn’t like this. He supposed he 
was imagining something himself. 

“Look here,” he said, pointing. 
“Do you see that tooth?” He stared, 
the others with him, at the tooth un- 
der the dim light. “Why, there are 
people there!” he said, as gas seemed 
to be pervading the room. 

Garney choked. Was it imagina- 
tion, or did the three of them see 
a puff very much like that when a 
photographer’s flashlight goes off? 
There was an acrid odor in the room. 
Or did they imagine that? 

Radley turned in his chair. He 
didn’t like this. It was a boomerang 
coming back on his head, playing a 
joke on him; for it seemed to him 
that there was some strange crea- 
ture in the room, something that he 
felt but couldn’t see. Something 
that seemed to have power even 
greater than his. 

He pointed. “What is that?” he 
said. “Oh, just a curtain, Robert. 
Well, Lois — look, Lois! Do you 
see what is in that tooth? I’ll tell 
you what’s there. A village. A vil- 
lage that existed in a land long ago. 
See! There are natives running 
about. And there — there is the 
chief. You see him, Robert, don’t 
you?” 

“I do,” the dentist said. “I do!” 

“And you see him, Lois, don’t 
you?” 

“Why, of course!” 

Radley looked around. He wished 
he could throw off this creepy feel- 
ing. It must be that he had worked 
himself up. 

“Now, I’ll tell you,” he said, “the 
story of that tooth. I told you that 
I had a premonition, Robert, in a 
dream. It came to me that I was 



THE TOOTH 



91 



carrying in my mouth a tooth that 
was carried by people down through 
the ages, a tooth whose power its 
former owners never suspected. It 
was originally in the mouth of a 
man who was under the spell of an 
evil magician who lived long ago. 
Or do you believe in such things, 
Robert? There were witch doctors, 
you know. Well, the magician had 
the man under a spell until he was 
ill from the tooth. He died from 
the bad effects of the tooth. And 
the magician said that the tooth 
would go on through the ages and 
that those having it would be ill and 
that misfortune would overtake 
them. And that finally an old man 
would die unless the tooth came out. 
And I am that man, Robert. It was 
caught in time. And in the dream I 
saw what had taken place — that all 
the people in that village where the 
evil magician lived had been put in 
that tooth. And see, see! There 
they are now, Robert! Look at the 
chief!” 

“I see him!” Garney said. 

“I do, too!” said Lois. “Doctor 
Radley, we are looking at another 
world.” 

“We are, my dear; and we are 
going into it.” 

“But we can’t do that!” Garney 
cried. “Think of Lois!” 

“I am thinking of her,” Radley 
said. “Robert and Lois, we are go- 
ing into that world now, but we must 
call upon the unseen forces to send 
us on our way. Help us! Help us, 
wherever you are!” Radley cried. 
“We want to go!” 

A gust of wind blew in the win- 
dow, upsetting a vase. The curtains 
shook. The acrid odor again seemed 
to be in the room. 

Was that a voice he heard? 

“ You have commanded.” 

And then, as Radley closed his 



eyes, whether he imagined it or not, 
the room seemed to go up in smoke; 
he seemed to be floating through air ; 
gases seemed to envelop him — and 
then suddenly he looked up. 

“See?” he said. “We are here, 
Robert and Lois. In this strange 
country. And there is the chief.” 

Robert and Lois did see the chief. 
He was coming toward them. A big 
black fellow he was, with protruding 
lips and beady eyes. He carried a 
club, which he swung as if with au- 
thority. He stopped. 

And then suddenly he beheld a 
woman. A white woman. A beauti- 
ful woman. He ran toward her. 

Lois shrank back. Garney, stand- 
ing near her, put his arm around her. 
As the chief raised his club, Gar- 
ney’s arm tightened. 

And then the voice of the scientist 
came to him. 

“Come, Robert, must get out 
of this! We can find the way back.” 

Again gases seemed to envelop 
them ; there was that puff ; they 
seemed to be floating on air — and 
then they were looking at the tooth 
on the table. 

Radley was sitting in his chair. 
Garney had his arm around Lois. 
His head was against her cheek. Im- 
pulsively, he turned and kissed her. 

“You love her, don’t you?” said 
Radley. 

“I’ve always loved her,” said Gar- 
ney. 

And then Radley got up and put 
the tooth into his pocket. 

“Come, Robert,” he said. “Come, 
Lois.” 

He passed his hand before them, 
and they moved their eyes. 

The arm was around her, and Gar- 
ney was looking into her eyes. 

But as Radley left, he was not 
absolutely sure himself just what 
had happened. 



He From Proycon 

The Thought-Variant Novel 

He looked upon the world from his shining globe and 



saw intelligent life — or was it intelligent? Suppose 
he were to experiment ? 

the greatest story yet written by 

NAT SCHACMMER 



E FROM PROCYON saw 
the insignificant star glim- 
mer redly in the depths of 
the universe. What it was that at- 
tracted his attention to it he did not 
know. There were hundreds of other 
stars in its immediate sector, far 
more brilliant, more brazen in their 
clangorous demands. Perhaps it was 
its very mediocrity that caught his 
fancy. So he plotted his course to- 
ward the modest little gleam. 

The huge, many-faceted sphere 
swirled with magnetic currents. The 
swift light waves crisscrossing the 
universe felt the imperious pull, and 
swerved to concentrate their stores 
of energy photons on the angled 
plates. The impacts hurled the shell 
in the new direction, at a speed only 
slightly under that of light. 

Alpha Centauri heaved into view, 
a dazzling blob against the im- 
mensities of space, and receded into 
the distance. Then there was noth- 
ingness, five years of it almost, while 
the dim red Sun grew from insig- 
nificance to respectable dimensions. 

Time was an empty phrase — no 
one of his fellows on that vast satel- 
lite of Procyon had as yet dissolved 
into mortality. At stated periods, 
however, a certain restlessness 



seized the individual. The infinite 
universe beckoned, beckoned with 
the fascination of new systems, new 
worlds, new knowledge. So one by 
one they departed in their bubble 
shells, to return in centuries of 
years, content, or never to return at 
all. He was still doubtful. He was 
a bit tired of the tremendous suns 
he had visited, of their crude physi- 
cal sameness. Life was what he was 
interested in, life informed with in- 
telligence, v/ith certain strange 
quirks and interesting oddities. 
Thus far, life had been a rare by- 
product of scattered worlds, slimy, 
sluggish, not far removed from the 
mineral. 

He was an invisible transparency 
of supermanlike form and dimen- 
sions. The basis of life on Procyon’s 
satellite was silicon rather than car- 
bon, silicon phosphorohydrates of 
complicated pattern. Only in cer- 
tain lights, rich in ultra-violet ema- 
nations, did the glasslike plasm be- 
come visible reality to eyes accus- 
tomed to infra-violet spectra. 

He yawned. Five years of noth- 
ingness and he was weary. The in- 
significant Sun was close by now. 
Planets swung around its redness, 
nine of them. For the moment he 





None of those swarming millions saw the godlike shape that 
hovered over them — none could 



94 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



hesitated. Even the four larger ones 
were not of respectable size. It was 
hardly possible that they were the 
abodes of life. Life required spa- 
ciousness to be anything else but 
slime. He searched the heavens. 
The next sun was eight light years 
ahead. He did not wish to travel 
any farther. Either he found what 
he was seeking here or he would 
turn back to Procyon and the so- 
ciety of his fellows. 

With indifferent weariness he de- 
cided between the two satellites that 
seemed to offer the greatest possi- 
bilities. One was enringed, a novel 
arrangement, but the other was 
larger, with a great red spot that 
might bear investigation. He 
yawned and plotted his course for 
the latter. Now whether it was the 
huge weariness that had assailed 
him, or one of the incredible diva- 
gations of chance, is unknown, but 
the fact remains that he made an 
error in his calculations. 

As a result the faceted sphere slid 
past the bulk of Jupiter, crossed the 
untenanted orbit of Mars, and al- 
most collided with a rushing speck 
before he was aware what had hap- 
pened. He swerved and was tempted 
to continue. Again fate intervened. 
A smaller mote swung suddenly 
from behind the tiny disk, loomed 
alarmingly. At the speed of light, 
maneuvering requires vast spaces. 
It was too late to swing to the right 
or left, and the space between the 
two orbs was uncomfortably narrow. 

He did the only thing that could 
be done. He cut the propulsive 
power of the light photons, swirled 
the magnetic current full force into 
the forward facet plates. The con- 
centration in front acted as a brake, 
retarding the tremendous velocity 
until, with cushioned ease, the shell 
sank to within a few thousand miles 
of the whirligig planet. A sudden 



whim seized him. He would land. 

Thus it was that Earth received 
a visitation that was destined to be 
fraught with the most surprising 
consequences for humanity at large 
and certain individuals in particular. 

THE SPHERE dropped slowly to 
the surface of a heaving ocean. It 
floated; a shimmering transparency 
in the ultra-violet radiations from 
the Sun. He anchored it by estab- 
lishing magnetic contact with the 
core of the planet on which he had 
fortuitously arrived. Then he 
looked around. 

To one side stretched the sea until 
the quick curvature of the globe 
showed a horizon line. On the 
other, however, dimly seen in the 
thick, strange atmosphere, was land. 

There were forms and structures 
on the rim of the land fronting the 
sea. Not as large or graceful, natu- 
rally, as those on Procyon’s satellite, 
but indubitably artificial. That 
meant life forms, denizens with at 
least a modicum of dim intelligence. 
He smiled ; a rare thing for his god- 
like complacence. 

The top of the sphere swung open. 
He rose. Around his middle ran a 
band of thin, transparent material. 
From it hung suspended tiny con- 
trivances of curious shape. He 
manipulated one, a miniature replica 
of the great facet globe. 

At once his shimmering form 
lofted through the opening, into the 
clear sunlight. Then he pressed an- 
other facet. The impact of the con- 
centrated photons drove him for- 
ward, straight for the city that 
sprawled with lancing spires along 
the shore, the city, in fact, of New 
York. 

No one saw the swift-flying one 
from Procyon; no one could. A 
shimmer, a slight dazzle of sunshine, 
and that was all. Even when later, 



HE FROM PROCYON 



97 



before him, arms akimbo, bitter with 
compressed lips, the mole with the 
three long hairs on her chin wag- 
gling as she spoke. Her speech was 
to the point and in a familiar strain : 
“You’re late now, Charles Doolit- 
tle, and you’ll be fired. You little 
no-count runt, why did I ever marry 
you? Me, what had the pick of a 
hundred men handsomer and richer 
than you. Look how I slaved and 
slaved all these years, and what 
thanks do I get? None! You lie 
there in bed like a lord, waiting, 
hoping, I’ll be bound, you’ll get 
fired. Well, let me tell you some- 
thing; if you do, I’m through. I’ll 
go home to mother.” 

Even in his unaccustomed daze, 
Doolittle remembered vaguely that 
Mrs. Doolittle’s mother was living 
with charitable, if reluctant rela- 
tives. His head ached, his brain was 
numb. The hypnotic sleep had 
found him a docile subject. But the' 
fact did remain that he was late; 
something he had never been in 
twenty-eight years of bank clerking. 

He blinked again, and looked at 
his virago of a wife. The mole with 
its three hairs annoyed him. Her 
endless pratings, too. Possibly it 
was the headache, possibly it was 
some other cause, but he did some- 
thing he had never done before in 
all his happy married life. He 
talked back to his wife; more, he 
spoke to her disrespectfully: 

“Go jump in the lake!” 

His wife stared at him with 
strange, wide-open eyes, in mid- 
flight on a particularly meaty 
phrase. Then she turned from her 
frightened lord and master and 
walked out of the room. The next 
moment the outer door slammed. 

Still trembling at his own temer- 
ity, but too drowsy to wonder, Doo- 
little fell back on the pillows and 

AST-7 



passed immediately into slumbrous 
snores. 

It seemed to him that he had been 
asleep only a minute when the sharp 
insistent clamor of the doorbell 
awakened him. Yawning, groaning, 
sucking his gums, Doolittle dragged 
himself out of bed, scuffed his feet 
into slippers, wriggled into a bath 
robe, and shuffled toward the door. 

He twisted the lock and found 
the door unlatched. He flung it 
open. 

“I don’t want ” he began peev- 
ishly. i 

A big policeman pushed his way 
into the foyer, kicked the door 
closed behind him with his foot. In 
his hand he held an open notebook. 
His stern glance shifted from the 
thoroughly scared bank clerk to the 
little book. 

“You Doolittle — Charles Doolit- 
tle?” There seemed menace in the 
way he said it. 

“Y-yes,” the wearer of the name 
stammered. 

The policeman consulted his book 
again. “Wife’s name Maria?” 

Doolittle refocused his thoughts. 
He remembered now his strange de- 
fiance of the morning, her leaving 
the house. 

He seized the third button on the 
blue coat in a panic of fear. “What 
happened to her? Maria — she hasn’t 
been ” 

The policeman shut his book with 
a snap. “Naw! She was pulled out 
in time. She’s over at the hospital 
now, getting over it.” 

“Pulled out! From where, what 
do you mean?” 

“From the reservoir over on 
Jerome Avenue. Lucky the watch- 
man saw her and fished her out with 
a pole.” 

“Maria, jumped in the reservoir! 
But why ” 

“She said you told her to do it!” 



96 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



clamped onto the base of the skull. 
A slight buzzing, and four infinitely 
thin edges sank deep into the bone, 
to rise again with a section of skull. 
Underneath, the gray convolutions 
of the brain palpitated with sleep- 
dreams. 

He probed the whorls and grayish 
masses apart until he was behind 
the third ventricle of the brain. 
There he found what he wanted ; the 
small reddish-gray, cone-shaped 
structure known as the pineal gland. 
Very carefully he pressed the 
crowding convolutions aside, shap- 
ing a tiny cavity around the conical 
body. Then he took one of the soft, 
round transparencies he had fash- 
ioned and inserted it into the space. 
From the ball dangled innumerable 
fine filaments. Two of these he su- 
tured to the pineal gland, the oth- 
ers to all of the vital structures of 
the brain. The probe was with- 
drawn, the trepanned skull section 
carefully lowered into place, hair 
and all, and the application of a 
warming ray sealed the lines of 
cleavage. 

The operation was over. 

He stepped back, smiled, and 
drifted out into the night to select 
at random the next subject for his 
peculiar experiment. 

There were six of them, four men 
and two women, alike unconscious 
of the incredible change that had 
come upon them in their sleep, un- 
aware of the inducing cause. Only 
the last man held faint awareness, 
and he dismissed it as a dream until 
later events focused the incident 
sharply in his attention. 

Outside, in the streets of New 
York, the roar of traffic grew heavy 
with the dawning of another work- 
day, the millions recommenced their 
appointed tasks. Everything seemed 
the same ; the newspapers carried 
the same stodgy headlines; life 



flowed in normal channels. The vis- 
itor from Procyon was as though he 
had not been. 

Yet within six heads, the mech- 
anisms inexorably fulfilled their ap- 
pointed tasks. Lives, fortunes, the 
very destinies of the world of man- 
kind hung in the balance. 

And faintly smiling, apart, he 
awaited the outcome of his strange 
experiment. The tiny machines 
were geared to run for one month 
of Earth time. That was ample, he 
felt. The urge to return to his own 
kind was strong within him; he did 
not v/ish to waste any longer period 
on this unimportant race of an un- 
important speck in the universe. 

II. 

AS HE WAS aroused, Charles 
Doolittle yawned, made soughing 
sounds with his lips, grunted, then 
burrowed his sparse, sandy hair 
deeper into the pillow. Something 
was roaring in his ears, and a strong, 
purposeful hand was shaking him by 
the shoulder. 

The roaring had a familiar pat- 
tern. 

“Get up, you lazy, good-for-noth- 
ing tramp; it’s after eight.” 

Doolittle tried opening his eyes. 
All he could achieve was a blink. 
In the back of his drugged con- 
sciousness was the struggling 
thought that it was late ; he was due 
at the bank at eight thirty sharp, 
and Wall Street was a long way 
from the Bronx. 

The next shake rattled every 
tooth in his head. Not even hyp- 
notic sleep could withstand such 
crude methods. He squirmed and 
forced himself to a sitting position. 
He rubbed his weak, nearsighted 
eyes. 

His wife, sharer of his joys and 
sorrows for twenty-six years, stood 

AST— 6 



HE FROM PROCYON 



97 



before him, arms akimbo, bitter with 
compressed lips, the mole with the 
three long hairs on her chin wag- 
gling as she spoke. Her speech was 
to the point and in a familiar strain : 
“You’re late now, Charles Doolit- 
tle, and you’ll be fired. You little 
no-count runt, why did I ever marry 
you? Me, what had the pick of a 
hundred men handsomer and richer 
than you. Look how I slaved and 
slaved all these years, and what 
thanks do I get? None! You lie 
there in bed like a lord, waiting, 
hoping, I’ll be bound, you’ll get 
fired. Well, let me tell you some- 
thing; if you do, I’m through. I’ll 
go home to mother.” 

Even in his unaccustomed daze, 
Doolittle remembered vaguely that 
Mrs. Doolittle’s mother was living 
with charitable, if reluctant rela- 
tives. His head ached, his brain was 
numb. The hypnotic sleep had 
found him a docile subject. But the 
fact did remain that he was late; 
something he had never been in 
twenty-eight years of bank clerking. 

He blinked again, and looked at 
his virago of a wife. The mole with 
its three hairs annoyed him. Her 
endless pratings, too. Possibly it 
was the headache, possibly it was 
some other cause, but he did some- 
thing he had never done before in 
all his happy married life. He 
talked back to his wife; more, he 
spoke to her disrespectfully: 

“Go jump in the lake!” 

His wife stared at him with 
strange, wide-open eyes, in mid- 
flight on a particularly meaty 
phrase. Then she turned from her 
frightened lord and master and 
walked out of the room. The next 
moment the outer door slammed. 

Still trembling at his own temer- 
ity, but too drowsy to wonder, Doo- 
little fell back on the pillows and 
AST— 7 



passed immediately into slumbrous 
snores. 

It seemed to him that he had been 
asleep only a minute when the sharp 
insistent clamor of the doorbell 
awakened him. Yawning, groaning, 
sucking his gums, Doolittle dragged 
himself out of bed, scuffed his feet 
into slippers, wriggled into a bath 
robe, and shuffled toward the door. 

He twisted the lock and found 
the door unlatched. He flung it 
open. 

“I don’t want ” he began peev- 
ishly. f 

A big policeman pushed his way 
into the foyer, kicked the door 
closed behind him with his foot. In 
his hand he held an open notebook. 
His stern glance shifted from the 
thoroughly scared bank clerk to the 
little book. 

“You Doolittle — Charles Doolit- 
tle?” There seemed menace in the 
way he said it. 

“Y-yes,” the wearer of the name 
stammered. 

The policeman consulted his book 
again. “Wife’s name Maria?” 

Doolittle refocused his thoughts. 
He remembered now his strange de- 
fiance of the morning, her leaving 
the house. 

He seized the third button on the 
blue coat in a panic of fear. “What 
happened to her? Maria — she hasn’t 
been ” 

The policeman shut his book with 
a snap. “Naw! She was pulled out 
in time. She’s over at the hospital 
now, getting over it.” 

“Pulled out! From where, what 
do you mean?” 

“From the reservoir over on 
Jerome Avenue. Lucky the watch- 
man saw her and fished her out with 
a pole.” 

“Maria, jumped in the reservoir! 
But why ” 

“She said you told her to do it!” 



98 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



That was how it began — the first 
half-farcical, half-tragic result of 
the man from Procyon’s peculiar op- 
erations. 

ALFRED JORDAN, holding 
down a minor job in the fax depart- 
ment, glowered at his opponent. 

“I’m telling you, Joe,” he growled, 
“it’s the country’s only chance. Put 
in a good, strong man, and give him 
power, all of it.” 

“G’wan!” said Joe. “What’d hap- 
pen to the organization? What’d 
happen to our jobs?” 

“To hell with our jobs!” Jordan 
declared violently. “The trouble 
with this country is, it has no guts. 
It can’t take it. Army discipline, 
that’s what it needs; some one to 
give ’em orders, tell ’em what to do.” 
Joe stared at him curiously. 
Clancy, the chief clerk, was talking 
earnestly at his desk to Halloran, 
the powerful district leader. 

“Army discipline,” Joe repeated, 
then laughed. “Sure, I forgot. Let 
me see. Wasn’t you a captain or 
something during the War? Swiv- 
eled a chair for the duration down 
in Washington — checking pup tents, 
wasn’t it?” 

The dark blood rushed to Jordan’s 
naturally dark countenance. That 
inglorious record was a sore spot. 

“Never mind about that,” he 
snapped. “I’m telling you — we need 
a man who knows how to run things, 

who isn’t afraid to tell ’em ” 

“Like who, for instance?” 

Alfred Jordan exhaled slowly. 
The overpowering, overweening 
dream of many sleepless nights. He 
hardly knew he had spoken. “Like 
me, for instance.” 

A raucous laugh burst through his 
vision like a knife through wrap- 
ping paper. 

“Well, Al, you always were a 
funny one, but this beats ’em all.” 



Halloran, the district leader, 
looked over at them in annoyance. 
Clancy made a fluttering movement 
with his hand for quiet. But Jor- 
dan did not see ; there was a red haze 
before his eyes. He shook a finger 
under Joe’s amused nose. 

“You think I couldn’t do it; I’m 
not good enough, hey?” 

“Sure, you are, Al!” Joe grinned. 
“Tell you what. Show ’em how good 
you are. There’s Halloran, the big 
shot, standin’ with Clancy. Go on 
over, an’ ask him for a better job. 
He’ll be glad to oblige.” 

Jordan turned abruptly on his 
heel. “I will.” 

Joe watched his fellow worker 
clump determinedly over to the 
sacrosanct desk. “The crazy loon!” 
he breathed. “He’s going to do it.” 

Alfred Jordan barged into the se- 
cret political conversation without 
preliminaries. “I want to talk to 
you, Mr. Halloran,” he announced 
abruptly. 

The district leader turned around. 
Clancy made choking sounds. 

“Go ’way, Jordan. Can’t you see 
I’m busy?” 

Halloran, to whom the remark had 
been addressed, stared slowly. His 
gaze turned rigid. 

“Sure, er — Jordan. What can I 
do for you?” 

Jordan plunged, not giving him- 
self time to think. “I’m tired of 
this hole. This tax job you gave 
me isn’t worth a damn. There’s no 
money in it, for one thing; for an- 
other, it’s a clerk’s job. I’ve got 
ability, I know I have; I want you 
to do better for me.” 

Clancy gasped. Al Jordan was 
nuts, talking to the district leader 
like that. 

But Halloran stood there rigid, 
blank. Invisible radiations seemed 
to reach out, to envelop his mind in 
a web of entangling circumstances. 



HE FROM PROCYON 



He spoke slowly, like a somnambu- 
list, like an automafon: 

“Sure, Mr. Jordan, anything you 
say. I always thought you had the 
makings of something good in you. 
What job d’you want?” 

Jordan was beyond fear, beyond 
surprise even. “I want,” he stated 
boldly, “the police commissioner- 
ship.” 

“All right, Mr. Jordan. I’ll do 
everything I can. There’s a meeting 
of the committee this evening. It’ll 
be a tough job, but I’ll make ’em do 
it. There’s lots o’ things owing to 
me.” 

Clancy almost had a fit. He could 
not believe his ears. Yet the morn- 
ing papers the following day carried 
huge scareheads. 

SURPRISING SHAKE-UP IN 
POLICE DEPARTMENT 

“Late last night Police Commis- 
sioner Mullen announced his resig- 
nation, giving poor health as the 
reason. 

“It is significant, however, that it 
followed on a meeting of the county 
committee and a long, confidential 
phone conversation with the mayor. 
Though it was eleven o’clock at 
night when the resignation was 
placed in the mayor’s hands, at 
eleven ten his honor gave to the 
press the name of the new police 
commissioner. 

“He is Alfred Jordan, an obscure 
clerk in the tax department, and a 
member of District Leader Hallo- 
ran’s club. Political circles are 
buzzing with excitement. Who is 
Jordan? Why had he been given 
this important post? 

“When approached for a state- 
ment, Halloran said that the change 
had long been contemplated; that 
there was too much crime and law- 
lessness in the city, that what was 
needed was an iron hand, strong dis- 



99 

cipline. Captain Alfred Jordan, by 
reason of his army experience, was 
the man best qualified for the diffi- 
cult post. 

“Investigation of Jordan’s army 
career, however, shows that ” 

He from Procyon smiled under 
the protecting mantle of his invisi- 
bility. The comedy was slowly gath- 
ering momentum. 

NUMBER THREE and number 
four knew each other. You see, Ali- 
son La Rue, nee Alice Jones, was a 
chorus girl; third from the left in 
the front row of the new Cary Vani- 
ties. Very personable and shapely 
she was, as indeed she had to be to 
have reached her present exalted po- 
sition. Platinum-blond hair, big, 
baby-blue eyes with eyelashes care- 
fully mascaraed, large, pouting lips 
red-curved in accordance with the 
mode, size thirty-six and other meas- 
urements to match, legs that were a 
treat to the tired business men in 
the front rows — in short, the very 
ideal of Miss America. Her slightly 
vacuous smile was regularly fea- 
tured in the rotogravures, but her 
catty friends — of the female persua- 
sion, of course — disrespectfully re- 
ferred to her as “that dumb cluck.” 

Number four knew her, not merely 
in the large general sense that she 
was known to her “public,” but in 
more intimate, personal ways. 
Backstage, dressing rooms, road 
house and-— elsewhere. 

She was talking to him now in 
exasperated tones. She was due to 
go on in the opening scene of the 
matinee performance — a great, 

scantily clad chrysanthemum, of 
which she was an outer petal. It 
lacked ten minutes of curtain time, 
and they were standing backstage in 
the cavernous theater. 

“Listen to me, Tony!” Her voic* 
was hard, compact. “I’m sick an’ 



100 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



tired o’ being made a fool of. I’m 
a good-natured girl, but you’re giv- 
ing me the run-around. A girl can’t 
afford to waste her youth for noth- 
ing. You promised me that string 
of sparklers over two months now, 
and you’re as full of excuses as a 
fish is of water. I’m through. Go 
out ’n’ get ’em, or don’t come back. 
See?” 

Anthony Marshall winced. In the 
first place he was forty-five, with an 
alarmingly protruding stomach and 
more than a hint of gout, the result 
of years of good living, drinking, 
and idling. In the second place, he 
had no money. His bank had en- 
forced notice of that on him when 
his last check bounced back. 

“I’m sorry about that, baby,” he 
pleaded. “I’ll get it for you soon. 
Just now I’m a bit short. My bro- 
ker ” 

“T’blazes with your broker,” she 
4 broke in rudely. “You heard me, 
and it goes. The sparklers, or we’re 
through.” 

It was unfortunate of course that 
both of them had received similar 
operations. In the circumstances, 
the radiations of their respective 
wills neutralized each other and left 
them in status quo. 

A man hurried by, agitated, intent 
on important things. It was Cary 
himself, the great producer. Mar- 
shall knew him slightly; it was his 
business to know every one. 

“Hello, Cary!” he greeted. 

The other merely grunted, de- 
toured, was on his way again. 

Anthony Marshall was a wit. He 
looked at the sullen beauty again 
and shouted after the retreating 
producer. 

“Hi there, Cary! How about giv- 
ing me a million dollars? Miss La 
Rue claims she can’t get along on 
less.” 

The man stopped dead in his 



tracks. The noise of the approach- 
ing curtain was deafening. Some- 
thing had gone wrong in the open- 
ing number that needed his urgent 
attention. Yet he turned back to 
Marshall, face set in a strange rig- 
idity, impelled by invisible forces. 

“I — I’m sorry, Marshall, I can’t 
give you that much. I’m not as rich 
as people think. This show put me 
in the red a lot.” 

Anthony stared at him bitterly. 
The joke was being turned on him. 

“Now let me see,” Cary continued 
intently, “I have around thirty-five 
thousand in the bank — I can give 
you that — my show holdings and 
houses could realize even now about 
a hundred and eighty thousand — 
maybe ” 

Marshall cut him short. He must 
turn the joke back again on Cary 
somehow. 

“O. K., old man,” he said, genially. 
“Never mind the show business or 
the houses. Just write me out a 
check for thirty-five thou’ and we’ll 
call it quits.” 

“Right away, Mr. Marshall,” Cary 
said, and took a folder check book 
from his inside pocket, unclipped 
his fountain pen, rested the book on 
a near-by table, and began to write. 

“There it is,” he said at last, rip- 
ping the check from the stub, and 
handing it to Marshall. 

Marshall took it gingerly, glanced 
at it with suspicious eyes. He ex- 
pected to see staring him in the face 
some comical remarks. 

He looked at it again. His hand 
trembled. It was a real, sure- 
enough check for thirty-five thou- 
sand drawn to the order of Anthony 
Marshall and signed — Lucian Cary. 

He clutched the producer by the 
shoulder, spoke hoarsely: “What’s 
the joke?” 

“Joke?” The man was surprised. 



HE FROM PROCYON 



101 



“None at all. It’s what you asked 
for.” 

“The check is good?” 

“The check is good.” 

Anthony looked at his wrist 
watch — twenty to three. The bank 
closed at three. Lucky it was only 
five blocks down Broadway. If only 
he could get it certified! 

“Hey, big boy, where are you go- 
ing?” Alison La Rue yelled after his 
rapidly moving back. 

Marshall flung over his shoulder: 
“See you to-night, after the show. 
The necklace is practically yours.” 

Then he was gone. 

III. 

ALISON LA RUE did a lot of 
heavy thinking during the matinee. 
It was hard, unaccustomed work, so 
it was but natural that when the liv- 
ing chrysanthemum began to rotate 
rapidly to the music, one of the yel- 
low petals was woefully out of step. 
For which she was duly and expertly 
excoriated by the stage manager. 
But she did not care; her mind was 
on other things. 

Immediately following the per- 
formance, she waylaid Lucian Cary, 
put on her best kittenish smile. 
“Hello, Mr. Cary! I’d like to talk 
to you.” 

Cary had deep pouches under his 
eyes; he seemed to be in a state of 
high excitement, but at her request 
he turned rigid, said: “Of course, 

Miss La Rue.” 

“You were very good to Tony 
Marshall. I think you’re a swell fel- 
ler.” 

The coy remark had unexpected 
results. At the mention of Mar- 
shall’s name, Cary’s face swirled 
with blood until it looked as if he 
would have a stroke. “That dirty 
so and so!” he screamed. “He did 
me out of thirty-five thou’. I must 



have been drunk. And he got it 
certified, too, cleaned me out, before 
I woke up and tried to stop payment. 
Just wait till I see that guy.” 

Alison, or Alice, was astounded. 
Her scheme was being knocked into 
a cocked hat. She started to slink 
away. 

“You wanted to speak to me, 
didn’t you?” 

Something urged her on then. 
“I’d like to get a better part, Mr. 
Cary. I’ve got the looks an’ the 
figure, an’ everything.” 

Cary’s face was a set mask, the 
kind that was to become a familiar 
sight around New York and else- 
where very shortly. When he spoke 
it seemed as if it were some one 
else, something not a part of him- 
self. 

“Certainly, Miss La Rue. I’ve had 
my eye on you for a long time. Now 
let me see. I’m not satisfied with 
Gordon in the lead part; suppose 
you take off a week to rehearse it 
and I’ll put you on in her place.” 

The stage, the theater, the earth 
itself seemed to rock and sway 
around her. She, in the leading 
role! In her wildest dreams she 
hadn’t thought — the guy was crazy 
— hadn’t even made a pass at her — 
but 

She looked at him sharply. “I can 
count on that?” 

“The contract will be drawn to- 
morrow. I can’t change my mind.” 

Therein he spoke the truth. She 
had clinched his continuing obedi- 
ence by her last command. And, 
exactly one week later, electricians 
climbed the parquet in front of the 
theater, took out the bulbs that 
spelled the name of Cissie Gordon, 
and rearranged them to read “Alison 
La Rue.” 

And that same night, a bewildered 
audience saw the most atrocious per- 
formance that had ever disgraced a 



102 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Broadway theater. Poor Alison ca- 
vorted around the stage in the be- 
lief that she was a wow; her voice 
was cracked and off key, her acting 
terrible, her coyness flat. In short, 
by the time the final curtain had 
fallen on a perspiring, enraged cast, 
and an equally enraged audience was 
pell-melling out of the theater, a 
smash hit had been converted into a 
total flop. 

Alison La Rue sulked and sobbed 
in her tents. She hadn’t learned the 
trick, the power that was in her. 
Had she commanded the audience to 
believe she was Sarah Bernhardt, 
Eleanore Duse, and Katherine Cor- 
nell rolled into one, they would have 
turned handsprings and gone out to 
proclaim it to a cockeyed world. 

CRAIG WENTWORTH paced 
restlessly up and down the floor of 
his laboratory. Those few compe- 
tent to judge knew him as an ex- 
traordinary physicist, who, with lit- 
tle or no backing, had opened new 
fields of thought. 

Dr. Knopf watched his pacings 
with alert, anxious eyes. He did not 
like the feverish brittleness to his 
friend’s speech, nor the content of it. 

Wentworth whirled on 'him. His 
big body was taut, his eyes burned 
with strange fires. 

“You don’t believe a word I’m say- 
ing?” He was careful not to de- 
mand belief. 

Dr. Knopf folded his hands judi- 
cially. He was an excellent neu- 
rologist and all-around medical prac- 
titioner. 

“Well,” he hesitated and weighed 
his words carefully, “it does sound 
a bit incredible. All those instances 



“Go over them again,” Wentworth 
said eagerly, “and you’ll see they’re 
not mere coincidences.” He ticked 
them off on his fingers. “Ten days 



ago a meek, henpecked bank clerk 
tells his wife to go jump in the lake. 
She does it, and declares afterward 
she felt something force her to 
obey.” 

Dr. Knopf shrugged. “We run up 
against many such cases in our prac- 
tice,” he murmured. “Sudden self- 
assertion on the part of a habitu- 
ally downtrodden worm so surprises 
the bully that it has a real hypnotic 
effect.” 

“Granted!” Wentworth said impa- 
tiently. “Take the next, though. A 
petty politician, a nobody, forces 
Halloran, the big shot in this man’s 
town, to make him police commis- 
sioner. Same day, mind you, as 
item number one.” 

The neurologist shrugged again. 
“Blackmail,” he suggested. “The 
little fellow had something on Hal- 
loran.” 

“There were more. Take the case 
of Alison La Rue; a cheap chorus 
girl, of the dumb gold-digger type, 
forcing her way into the lead of a 
smash hit and closing it up the same 
night. Cary had the reputation of 
being a very shrewd producer.” 

This time Dr. Knopf smiled. 
“Such instances are not rare in the 
history of the stage,” he pointed out. 
“I am told the lady in question had 
a certain amount of blond looks.” 

“Sure!” Wentworth retorted sar- 
castically. “And so did Anthony 
Marshall who nicked the same smart 
showman to the tune of thirty-five 
thousand dollars. Cary put up a yell 
the next day for its return, claim- 
ing mental coercion — even started 
suit. Two days later the suit was 
quietly dropped.” 

Dr. Knopf rose and moved 
thoughtfully past a row of motors. 
“Now that,” he remarked, “borders 
on the inexplicable. Knowing 
Broadway producers as I do, I’d say 
that any one who could get a dime 



HE FROM PROCYON 



103 



out of them was using much more 
than mental coercion.” 

“You refuse to be serious,” Went- 
worth said. “These are not coinci- 
dences. Every one of them occurred 
on the same day — October 26th. 
These were all instances I got out 
of the newspapers; the Lord knows 
if there are others which haven’t as 
yet broken into print.” 

“You’re trying to insinuate,” Dr. 
Knopf remarked evenly, “that some- 
thing happened to all of these per- 
sons simultaneously? Something 
that gave them the power to com- 
mand whatever they desired, force 
other mortals not so gifted to do 
their biddings; a sort of Aladdin’s 
lamp, in other words.” 

“Yes.” Wentworth’s tone was al- 
most defiant. 

Dr. Knopf went up to him, put 
his hand kindly on his shoulder. 

“We’re dealing in miracles now, 
my boy. I may say without undue 
modesty that I am as familiar with 
the workings of the human mind, 
and all the mental phenomena 
lumped under the generic terms of 
hypnotism and telepathy, as any one 
in the field. I tell you as positively 
as I know how that there is nothing 
to your theory; that it is contrary 
to all the laws of psychology; that 
every example you have given me 
can be explained rationally and 
without recourse to supernatural 
effects.” 

Wentworth took a deep breath, 
exhaled. “I didn’t tell you every- 
thing,” he said quietly. “For exam- 
ple, why I happened to go search- 
ing through the newspaper files for 
that particular date.” 

Dr. Knopf cast him a quick glance. 
“I had thought of that,” he admit- 
ted. “I could give you a long Latin 

term for such a ” 

“Mania,” Wentworth finished for 
him. “No; I’m not insane. Suppose 



I were to tell you that I have that 
same power myself; that that was 
the reason I searched for other ex- 
amples.” 

THE DOCTOR was on his feet 
instantly. “Craig, I’ve been think- 
ing of running down to the Florida 
keys for a few weeks’ tarpon fishing. 
Finest sport in the world. Why not 
come along with me — I get crabby 
as hell if I’m alone.” 

“So you do think it’s overwork 
and nerves — polite words, aren’t 
they?” Wentworth said calmly. 
“Well, I’m going to prove it — right 
here and now — on you!” 

Dr. Knopf stared at him. “You’re 
serious about this?” 

“I am,” Wentworth assured him. 
“I’m going to make you do some- 
thing you don’t want to do; some- 
thing that you will fight against do- 
ing with all your strength.” 

The neurologist threw back his 
head and laughed. “Try making me 
stand on my head.” 

“That would be a silly stunt and 
prove nothing. I’m going to compel 
you to disclose the most disgraceful 
episode in your life; the one that no 
doubt you have carefully kept in the 
most secret chambers of your mind.” 
Dr. Knopf was amused, settled 
himself comfortably. 

“Go ahead,” he invited. 

“Tell me all about it,” Wentworth 
said in a quite casual voice. 

The neurologist jerked his head, 
as if surprised. His thin, etched 
face took on set rigidity, his eyes 
stared blankly. The perspiration 
beaded on his forehead. A tre- 
mendous inner struggle was taking 
place. 

“You are right,” he said mechan- 
ically. “I thought my secret would 
die with me. It happened a long 
time ago, when I was much younger. 



104 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



I was an interne then; she was a 
nurse. I ” 

“That’s enough,” Wentworth 
broke in sharply. “I don’t want to 
hear any more.” 

Dr. Knopf swayed slightly, shook 
himself as if to break a spell. He 
sprang to his feet with a hoarse cry. 
“I said ” 

“Nothing,” Wentv/orth assured 
him. “I stopped you in time.” 

The neurologist sank back, trem- 
bling violently. He wiped his fore- 
head. There was fear in his eyes. 
“What are you — devil, or man?” 

“I told you.” 

“Something pulled at me, probed 
with inexorable pincers, forcing 
obedience in spite of all my strug- 
gles. I knew it was a test, yet I 
could not help myself.” 

“The others have that same 
power; I am convinced of it.” 

“It is a miracle,” the doctor said, 
“yet there must be some rational ex- 
planation. We are living in the 
twentieth century.” 

“The explanation may be worse 
than the effect.” 

“What do you mean?” 

Wentworth told him of his queer 
vision of the night of October 25th, 
the drugged consciousness, the ache 
at the back of his head. 

“He was no vision,” he concluded. 
“I am certain of that now. He did 
something to my brain, to the brains 
of others — God knows how many. 
Nor was he of this world. There 
was an air of remoteness, of de- 
tached amusement about him, as 
though he were a superscientist re- 
garding me as an experimental 
guinea pig.” 

“Hmmm!” said Dr. Knopf indis- 
tinctly. He was beyond skepticism 
now. “A being from another world, 
a scientist, a surgeon possibly. You 
say your head ached?” 

“Horribly. In the back.” 



The neurologist went quickly to 
his friend and forced him down into 
a chair. Expert fingers probed the 
skull, finding nothing. Grunting his 
impatience, Knopf pushed the black 
wavy hair apart, searching, afraid to 
find what he suspected. 

A low gasp escaped him, a gasp 
compounded of horror and scientific 
eagerness. He had found it — the al- 
most invisible line of ensealment of 
the trepanned square of skull. 

“What is it?” Wentworth asked 
anxiously. 

“Unbelievable !” The little doctor 
literally dragged the bigger man 
after him. “Come to my office, at 
once. I must see; I must see!” 

Exactly two hours later he had 
seen. Wentworth had been sub- 
jected to every possible type of ex- 
amination ; he had been fluoroscoped, 
X-rayed, pushed, prodded, thumped, 
tested with delicate instruments at- 
tuned to every type of radiation. 

The strange transparent ball at- 
tached to the pineal body showed 
opaque to X-Ray and fluoroscope ; 
every time Wentworth exercised his 
will, a certain galvanometer, so deli- 
cate in its operations it could catch 
the whispers of cosmic rays them- 
selves, reacted with barbaric vio- 
lence. 

The neurologist muttered and 
groaned to himself throughout the 
long proceeding. He bubbled and 
effervesced with excitement. “Went- 
worth,” he said earnestly, when it 
was finally over, “let me operate on 
you; remove that confounded ball. 
Let me find out its secret. Do you 
realize what it would mean? The 
greatest discovery of all time! The 
greatest ” 

“Stop it,” Wentworth said 
sharply, forgetting. 

Dr. Knopf stopped in mid-flight. 
His will was like water. 

“There’s the answer,” Craig said 



HE FROM PROCYON 



105 



more carefully. “Don’t you realize 
what such a discovery would mean 
to the world? The slightest com- 
mand would require instant obedi- 
ence, no matter how thoughtless, no 
matter how terrible. Try to envi- 
sion a world like that — how long 
would such a world last?” 

Dr. Knopf thought reluctantly. 
“At least,” he implored, “we could 
limit the discovery to a few chosen 
people, of proved intelligence and 
high ideals. They would govern the 
world — bring about Utopia.” 

Wentworth shook his head deci- 
sively. “Utopia would soon prove 
the worst kind of hell. Our choices 
would not be infallible. One un- 
scrupulous person so equipped — and 
there would be no end to the harm 
done. Look what has already hap- 
pened with the others. There is 
only one thing to do — watch for 
manifestations, find out who else 
possesses this power; do something 
to negate, destroy, their influence. 
We cannot allow this to proceed too 
far. If I thought it would help, I 
would kill myself, but I am needed. 
I am the only safeguard against 
those others, the irresponsible wield- 
ers of power.” 

AS A MATTER of fact there was 
only one other thus far unmen- 
tioned. Her name was Margaret 
Simmons and she was a school- 
teacher, already a bit weary of the 
eternal sameness of the schoolroom. 

She was twenty-five and not ex- 
actly beautiful. Her nose and mouth 
were too generously sized for that. 
But there was a certain feeling in 
the broad, calm brow, in the masses 
of soft, brown hair low on the fore- 
head, in the firm line of the chin, in 
the informed intelligence that per- 
meated her features. 

Men were glad to talk to her, that 
is, men of a certain standard of 



brains and culture. But their talk 
was invariably of the things of the 
mind, and not of the heart. She was 
weary of that, too. She would gladly 
have traded all her intelligence for 
the beauty of form of, say, Alison 
La Rue. 

As yet of course she did not know 
of her new powers. She was singu- 
larly modest in her demands; she 
shrank innately from requirements 
on other people. Yet she had no- 
ticed, and marveled at, the sudden 
and implicit obedience to her light- 
est wish from the hitherto rather 
unruly children of her class. 

“The darlings,” she thought. 
“Reason and patience have finally 
worked. They have come to under- 
stand.” 

She did not know that outside, 
released from the surprising com- 
pulsion of her will, the little brats 
were the despair of the neighbor- 
hood. 

Margaret walked slowly along 
West 72nd Street. She was on her 
Way home. A man came rapidly out 
of an imposing apartment house. 
His clothes were baggy, and his 
stride rapid. His eyes literally 
flamed ahead. They caught hers, 
seemed to pass right through. 

Her knees shook a bit. She knew 
suddenly, with awful clarity, that 
she wanted this man, wanted him 
badly, more than anything she had 
ever wanted in her whole hitherto 
uneventful life. 

So intense was her sudden love 
that Craig Wentworth, who should 
have proved entirely immune, felt 
the shock of it pass like a wave 
through his brain. He stopped 
short, stared at this strange young 
woman who had affected him so pe- 
culiarly. 

Margaret Simmons saw what she 
had done, felt the impact of that 
seemingly rude stare, and was lost 



106 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



in shame. With lowered eyes she 
walked quickly past, submerged her- 
self in the crowd of afternoon pedes- 
trians. She did not stop hurrying 
until she had reached the furnished 
room that was her home. She threw 
herself on the bed and sobbed. 

Wentworth did not awake from 
the shock until it was too late. He 
started to walk fast after her, but 
she had already disappeared. He 
was positive that this casual pass- 
er-by was another of those who had 
been chosen for the strange experi- 
ment. “Good Lord!” he groaned. 
“How many more of them are 
there?” 

Yet, somehow, his spirits were 
strangely lightened. There was no 
feeling of menace about this girl as 
there had been about the others. 
There was something warming about 
the impact of her personality. 

He went on his way, evolving 
plans. 

IV. 

ALFRED JORDAN fingered the 
card in his hands. Neatly engraved 
on it was “Craig Wentworth” — 
nothing else. “I don’t know the 
man,” he said, “and I’m busy.” 

The secretary was oddly ill at 
ease. “But,” he protested, “he said 
that— — ” 

“I don’t care what he said ; I won’t 
see him.” 

“I rather think you will,” a quiet 
voice answered. Wentworth had 
come into the inner office unob- 
served. 

The black blood stormed over the 
police commissioner’s face. “What 
the devil do you mean by forcing 
your way in like that? Get out and 
stay out! Hollis!” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“Show him out. Throw him out 
if he won’t go quietly.” 



“You of course won’t do anything 
of the kind,” Wentworth observed 
equably. 

The secretary wavered in despair 
between the clash of wills. There 
was nothing he could do, so he did 
the next best thing. He hurried 
from the room. 

His chief, the police commis- 
sioner, stared after him in shocked 
wonder. It was the first time that 
any one had dared to disobey him. 

The realization of his power had 
come upon him slowly. Dazed as he 
was by his sudden accession to high 
office, the wheels had been greased 
all the way. Veteran inspectors, 
boiling with anger at this political 
upstart, came into his presence and 
went away meek as lambs, mere yes- 
men. The newspapers had raised a 
great to-do, but not for long. Cyni- 
cal reporters came, interviewed with 
previous tongue in cheek, went back 
to write glowing articles. 

Jordan was gradually sensing his 
power, deliberately exerting his 
will. He invited the high and 
mighty managing editors themselves 
to a conference. The next day 
every metropolitan newspaper expe- 
rienced a change of heart; Alfred 
Jordan was God’s own gift to the 
police situation — the greatest — blah 
— blah 

The mayor himself, waking up 
with a headache the day after the 
appointment, was aghast at himself. 
One interview, however, in which 
he had intended laying down the 
law, found him as meek and acquies- 
cent as the rest. 

As for the rank and file of the 
force, that is, every policeman who 
came under the personal impact of 
his will, they were obedient automa- 
tons. 

He was fully aware by now of his 
peculiar gift. Just what it meant 
scientifically, he neither knew nor 



HE FROM PROCYON 



107 



cared. He had a definite vision of 
himself as a second Mohammed, a 
new Alexander, a greater Mussolini 
or Hitler. His ambition vaulted. 
The police commissionership al- 
ready seemed petty. Mayor was bet- 
ter, governor even ; yes, the very 
presidency itself. And why stop 
there, he had already asked himself? 
Alfred Jordan the First, Dictator 
of the World! Dazzling fantasy! 

Yet he was shrewd enough to real- 
ize the limitations of his influence. 
Already he had had evidence of it. 
Personal definite imposition of will 
was required. He must work slowly, 
step by step. But within those lim- 
its there had been no disobedience. 
Now 

“You are surprised, eh, Jordan?” 
said this most surprising intruder, 
seating himself calmly in the com- 
fortable armchair next the official 
desk. “It’s the first time you’ve 
been crossed since the morning of 
October 26th.” 

The police commissioner jumped 
to his feet, gripped the desk top 
hard with straining fingers. 

“How did you know ” 

“I know everything,” Wentworth 
told him. “I know for example that 
you slept more heavily than usual 
the night of the 25th, that you awoke 
with a strange headache, that, con- 
trary to common report, you had 
nothing on Halloran. You asked for 
the job and you got it, even as you’ve 
demanded other things since, and 
achieved every one. Already you’re 
dreaming grandiose dreams.” 

Jordan sank limply back into his 
chair. This was impossible! The 
man was uncanny. He forced him- 
self to will, with gritted teeth. 

“Go out; go out; go out!” 

But the stranger sat on, wholly 
at ease. 

“It doesn’t work,” he remarked. 
“You see, I am immune to your will- 



ing. I possess the same powers that 
you have.” 

Jordan’s brain whirled. “You 
mean- — ” he gasped. 

Wentworth leaned forward. “Ex- 
actly what I said. There are oth- 
ers, too. We are not the only ones.” 

“Who are they?” Jordan asked 
quickly. 

Wentworth saw his blunder at 
once. “That,” he said, “I won’t tell 
you. But I have a proposition to 
make. Yours is a dangerous gift, 
one that eventually will spell disas- 
ter not only to ourselves as indi- 
viduals, but to the world. Nature 
knew what she was doing when she 
withheld it from us. We are finite 
human beings, with a confused med- 
ley of emotions and desires. Not all 
of them are good ; many are harmful. 
Give it up, Jordan, for your own 
good, for the good of the race. I 
agree to do the same; we shall per- 
suade, use force if necessary, to 
compel the others.” 

He was pleading, desperately in 
earnest, trying to make this man see 
the light before it was too late. 

Jordan sat and thought it over. 
The man was crazy to think he 
would give up such tremendous 
power. Let the fool do so for him- 
self, if he desired; more, find ways 
of compelling him, even as he sug- 
gested. The thought of murder flit- 
ted casually through the mind of 
the police commissioner. But there 
were the others. Who were they? 

Wentworth waited a decent inter- 
val. “Well,” he asked. 

“It sounds reasonable,” Jordan ad- 
mitted blandly. “Who are the oth- 
ers?” 

Wentworth shook his head. “I’ll 
tell you that,” he said, “when you 
have agreed; when the others have 
agreed, too.” 

Jordan rose, shook hands cor- 
dially. “All right,” he said. “Get 



108 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



the others’ consent, and come back. 
I’ll see you then.” 

Wentworth walked out of head- 
quarters, knowing he had been de- 
feated in the first move. More, he 
had blundered. 

Jordan lifted the telephone. 
“Hello, Saunders! Man just went 
out, name of Craig Wentworth. Big 
fellow, baggy clothes, dark-haired, 
wearing a light-gray topcoat. Tail 
him; don’t let him shake you an in- 
stant. Report frequently. Hop 
to it.” 

Alfred Jordan sat back, rubbed 
his hands. He was over his first 
shock. He even smiled. 

THE SMILE, however, was 
erased that same evening, when 
Saunders called up the commission- 
er’s new duplex apartment on Park 
Avenue — he had willed several mil- 
lionaires during the past week to 
part with amounts totaling half a 
million. 

The detective was panicky. “I 
lost him, chief. Honest, I was on 
the job every second. I don’t know 
how he done it.” 

Jordan fairly screamed into the 
mouthpiece. “You lost him, you 
dumb cop ! Didn’t I tell you ” 

“Sure you did, chief. I tailed him 
to his place on Fifty-ninth. It’s 
some kind of a laboratory. I saw 
him go in, ’n lock the door. I spoke 
to the elevator boy; there was only 
one exit from the building, so I 
waited downstairs. Didn’t want him 
to get wise to me. I hung around 
all afternoon, an’ he didn’t come 
down. I swear it I went up again, 
and it was dark inside. I let my- 
self in with a skeleton key; an’ he 
was gone. The elevator boy swears 
he didn’t take him down.” 

“You blithering fool!” Jordan 
yelled. “He knew you were tailing 
him; changed his clothes in the 



laboratory, fixed himself up a dis- 
guise, and walked out right under 
your ugly nose. You get out and 
find him — you understand? I don’t 
care how long it takes you, but 
you’ve got to get him, and don’t 
come back till you do.” 

Alfred Jordan was right. Craig 
Wentworth, regretting his impulsive 
trip to the police commissioner, had 
suspected that things were about to 
happen. So he kept a weather eye 
open and had no difficulty in spot- 
ting the man who dogged his trail. 

Once in his laboratory, he called 
Dr. Knopf, explained the situation 
hurriedly. The neurologist clucked 
his tongue, and said : 

“Be careful, Craig! A man like 
Jordan won’t give up easily.” 

“I’m going to disappear,” said 
Wentworth grimly, “and work un- 
der cover. “You’ll have to be my 
headquarters hereafter; I’ll keep in 
touch with you.” 

“Be glad to help,” Dr. Knopf said 
heartily. “And don’t go making 
any more fool blunders like that.” 
Yet that was just what Went- 
worth did, that same evening. 

He switched to an old pair of 
overalls he found discarded in a 
closet, smudged his face with honest 
soot, dumped certain instruments 
and tools he needed into a battered 
old hand bag, hunched his shoulders, 
and slouched out past the cigar- 
decorated man who lounged in the 
entrance hall. 

He entered Dr. Knopf’s offices 
through the servants’ entrance, 
changed to more fitting clothes. 
Then he hunted for a quiet room in 
the rows of brownstone houses on 
the side streets, where not too many 
questions are asked, found one that 
fitted his modest purse, and was 
soon installed. Not for a moment 
did the thought enter his head that 
he could easily command unlimited 



HE FROM PROCYON 



109 



wealth by mere demand from any 
and sundry. 

IT WAS ABOUT nine when 
Wentworth had finished. The eve- 
ning was mild, and he thought the 
fresh air would be good after the 
turmoil of the day. The feeling that 
an extra-human instrument was 
lodged in his brain was uncomfort- 
able, though there was no actual 
physical sensation. He seemed to 
hear it ticking, ticking away, inter- 
minably. 

He walked briskly, absorbed, plan- 
ning, when he was brought up short 
by a collision with a young woman 
hurrying in the opposite direction, 
equally absorbed. 

“Oh!” she cried, and would have 
fallen if he had not put out a steady- 
ing hand. 

Recognition was simultaneous. 
Margaret Simmons colored, and 
tried to escape. The touch of his 
hand awoke unaccustomed reactions. 

Craig Wentworth grunted. Fate 
was playing right into his hands. 

“You are the girl who passed me 
on Seventy-second this afternoon,” 
he said severely. 

She tried vainly to extricate her- 
self from his still-held grip. 

“I don’t know what you are talk- 
ing about,” she said faintly. Her 
knees were weak. “Please let me 
go.” 

He grinned suddenly, released his 
hold. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I 
would like to talk to you — some- 
where where we wouldn’t be dis- 
turbed. Don’t misunderstand me; I 
have no ulterior designs. It is im- 
portant — for both of us.” 

She hesitated — proof positive to 
him of his former suspicions — and 
became suddenly reckless. 

“Very well,” she said simply, not 
a hint of inner, seething emotions 
showing on her placid face. “There 



is a little restaurant, near Amster- 
dam, where at this hour we’ll be all 
alone.” 

In the restaurant, securely en- 
sconced in a private alcove, they 
busied themselves in silence with 
their coffee and pie. All the while, 
Craig issued mental order after or- 
der — small things, like picking up a 
certain spoon at a certain moment — 
with no ascertainable effect. 

Therefore, when the plates had 
been pushed away, and cigarettes 
lighted, he had no hesitation in talk- 
ing. Thus he did the very thing 
that had led to such untoward re- 
sults with Jordan. Why he did it, 
he did not know, unless it was that 
the girl invited confidence; that she 
was so totally different from the 
newly appointed police commis- 
sioner. 

He told her the story from begin- 
ning to end, withholding nothing. 
Margaret listened quietly, hardly 
interrupting. Slow pallor spread 
over her face as realization forced 
its way of the strange thing within 
her brain, of the terrible power she 
now possessed, together with this 
big man with the compelling eyes, 
with others of whom she had barely 
heard. 

“So you see, Miss Simmons, the 
position we are in,” he concluded. 

“My first name is Margaret,” she 
told him. 

He smiled. “Quite right, Mar- 
garet. Mine is Craig,” and he con- 
tinued: “It is a terrible responsi- 

bility. I have to watch myself care- 
fully. I’m afraid even to think. 
The least desire on my part, and it 
is instantly gratified — that is, of 
course, if its fulfillment can be 
brought about by the person to 
whom it is addressed.” 

The panic went slowly out of her. 
Womanlike, she addressed the prob- 
lem to her own life. 



110 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



She, to whom the whole world was 
now a gigantic oyster, from which 
she could extract whatever she 
pleased, had no thoughts of wealth, 
of adulation, of power over mortal 
lives. Love was the only thing she 
craved, with all a woman’s ardor. 
She could command love now, it was 
true, make slaves of all men by vir- 
tue of the power within her. All, 
that is, except the one man on whom 
her affections had irrevocably cen- 
tered. He, of all the world, alone 
was immune to her will. There he 
sat, with composed features, con- 
versing with her as with a comrade, 
but without a spark of warmth, of 
tenderness, in his voice. 

What tremendous irony! What a 
cosmic jest! The taste of dust and 
ashes and sackcloth was in her 
mouth. She laughed bitterly, sud- 
denly. 

He looked up in surprise. He had 
been talking on and on, and she had 
not been listening. 

“You’re quite right, Craig,” she 
said hurriedly. “Such godlike power 
is not for mortals. We would only 
destroy ourselves, and the world, 
with its exercise. It means nothing 
to me; I don’t want it. Take me, 
please, to your Dr. Knopf. I am 
willing to submit at once to his op- 
eration, to remove this fatal gift 
that has been thrust on us. Take me 
at once.” 

Wentworth, a mere male, could 
not of course have followed the tor- 
tuous processes of her thought. He 
was surprised, rather than victo- 
rious. 

“It isn’t as easy as all that,” he 
said, somewhat startled. “If there 
were only the two of us, the matter 
would be comparatively simple. But 
there are others. I know now of 
four; there may be more. We shall 
need our powers. Without such aid 
we should be helpless against the 



others. Until we can fight this thing 
through, until we are certain every 
one at present so endowed has lost 
the gift, voluntarily or involuntarily, 
we must hold on. May I count on 
you?” 

She extended her hand frankly. 
They shook hands. There was no 
need for words. 

V. 

WITHIN THE week things be- 
gan to happen at an increasingly 
accelerated pace. In the first place, 
each of the six chosen persons was 
in varying degrees aware of his new 
gift. And each was using it in ac- 
cordance with the inherent laws of 
his own nature, as irrevocable as 
those of the Medes and the Persians. 

He from Procyon moved invisibly 
over the terrestrial scene, watching. 
The idea, he thought, had been an 
excellent one. 

Charles Doolittle faced his wife 
with fear and visions of retribution. 
But she was too weak to do any- 
thing but glare. And glaring from 
a reclining position in a hospital bed 
is a singularly ineffective procedure. 

By the time she was back in their 
two-room apartment, and the glare 
was in good working order again, 
Charles, the meek, the henpecked, 
had by a number of incidents, dis- 
covered the secret of his success. 
The slightest argumentative word 
from Maria, and he started signifi- 
cantly : 

“Go jump ” 

That was sufficient. Maria remem- 
bered the feel of gallons of city 
water and subsided quickly. More, 
she began to thrill strangely to her 
new meekness — it was at once a 
novel and satisfactory sensation. 
Her husband took on added glories; 
love, sniffed at for years, once more 
flooded her heart. 



HE FROM PROCYON 



111 



She actually boasted of his strange 
control to the neighbors, and thus 
it came to the attention of Jordan, 
police commissioner of New York, 
For Jordan was searching diligently 
for all such instances. 

The dragnet he had put out for 
Craig Wentworth had proved fruit- 
less. The man seemed to have dis- 
appeared off the face of the earth. 

Saunders, the detective, was 
picked up three days later by an am- 
bulance. He was in a state of col- 
lapse, footsore, blind with fatigue, 
starving, the mere shadow of a 
husky New York cop. The irascible 
command of the chief had been lit- 
erally obeyed, as in the nature of 
things it must. 

Alfred Jordan, not finding Went- 
worth, was compelled to hasten his 
plans. At the same time he con- 
ducted a relentless search for the 
others. Maria’s boastings were gos- 
siped of to the neighborhood cop, 
and ultimately reached the chief. 
By the end of the second week Jor- 
dan was informed as to five of the 
six. Only Margaret Simmons was 
unknown, and Wentworth, of course, 
was out of sight. 

Meanwhile Alison La Rue had 
once more blossomed into stardom. 
The show reopened in two days — 
Cary was like a puppet — and this 
time the scattering audience, under 
the impact of her will, almost tore 
the house down with frantic delight. 
Friend told friend, second-line crit- 
ics those of the first rank, who there- 
upon attended the next performance, 
and went out — conquered. She rode 
the crest high, wide, and handsome. 

Of course, she accepted Anthony 
Marshall’s string of diamonds, but 
she let it go at that. She had other 
admirers — and the gifts poured in. 
Not that Anthony was unduly heart- 
broken. He in turn for the first time 



tasted the delights of full and com- 
plete wallowing in every form of 
enjoyment. Acquaintances took to 
leaving everything but taxifare at 
home when they felt there was any 
chance of bumping into him, but it 
was useless. He made them write 
out checks — he always carried a sup- 
ply of blanks with him — or sent 
them posthaste to their strong boxes 
and vaults. 

The finest cook in the world 
worked for him; he had a yacht, a 
fleet of expensive cars, everything 
he laid eyes on and coveted. Only 
the gout remained from his former 
impecuniosity ; that, and an increas- 
ingly sensitive stomach. These he 
could not will away. 

JORDAN’S coup was scheduled 
for the 20th of November. His lines 
were laid. The police force, twenty- 
five thousand strong, were so many 
automatons, to be galvanized into ac- 
tion by the sound of his voice. 
Throughout the city he had secret 
stores of arms; machine guns, rifles, 
ammunition, light artillery, even a 
few tanks. Private conversations 
with the officers of the forts around 
New York had resulted in prompt 
and under-cover removals. 

The mayor of New York was his 
henchman, so was the governor. 
That meant the National Guard of 
the State. During the preparation 
period he made it his business to 
address every sort of gathering, the 
larger the better, American Legion 
posts, chambers of commerce, a foot- 
ball crowd at the stadium, a fight 
crowd in Madison Square Garden, 
binding th$m to his will. 

“Damn that fellow, Wentworth!” 
he raged to his secretary, Hollis. 
Hollis was in his confidence. Jor- 
dan had to have some one he could 
talk to. “Not found yet?” 

“No, chief. Every available detec- 



112 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



tive is on the prowl for him; every 
man on a beat has his description. 
He must have left New York.” 

The police commissioner paced 
back and forth with rapid, jerky 
steps, his black brows lowering. 

“He didn’t leave,” he said posi- 
tively. “I measured the guy pretty 
well when he was here. He’ll do his 
damnedest to throw a monkey 
wrench into the works. That fool, 
Saunders!” 

“What can he do?” asked Hollis. 
Jordan threw up his hands. “Do? 
I wish I knew. That’s what makes 
me worried. He’s been too quiet. 
He’s waiting for me; he’s got some- 
thing up his sleeve.” 

“We move to-morrow, don’t we?” 
“Yeah,” said Jordan heavily. “It’s 
too soon, but Wentworth’s hurried 
me. I’m afraid of him. It would 
have been easy if he weren’t around 
— or dead. Taken my time, made a 
tour of the country, spoken to mil- 
lions o’ people, seen Congress, the 
cabinet, the supreme court, the presi- 
dent. By the time I’d have been 
through, they’d have forgotten there 
was such a thing as a constitution, 
and made me dictator. This way, 
I’ve got to hurry, use force, start a 
revolution. Not, y’understand, that 
I’m afraid of a little blood — I was a 
captain in the War — but it’s messy.” 
“I think you overestimate this 
bird’s importance,” Hollis told him. 
“There are three others as well.” 
“Them!” said Jordan contemptu- 
ously. “Don’t make me laugh. I 
could let ’em alone, and it wouldn’t 
mean anything. But to-night they 
all get picked up. I don’t take 
chances. Wentworth, though, is a 
fellow of different caliber. He 
knows things.” 

Jordan was worried; that was cer- 
tain. And there was good reason for 
his alarm. 



IN THE meantime, Craig Went- 
worth had not been idle. The past 
weeks had been filled with furious 
preparation. He hired a small shack 
in a tumble-down section of the 
Bronx, brought the few instruments 
he had salvaged from his laboratory 
there, added to them by discreet bor- 
rowings from Dr. Knopf, and 
worked savagely night and day, driv- 
ing himself to the limit. 

“If only Jordan takes a little 
longer,” he told Margaret, “we’ll be 
able to checkmate him. I need 
time.” 

He had made it a regular habit to 
meet her after school for an hour 
or two, and dash right back to the 
Bronx, to plunge into his work un- 
til long past midnight. 

Margaret was perforce happy at 
the daily sight of him, but she 
would have been very much more so 
if the conversation had not been 
wholly confined to Jordan, the men- 
ace, plans and speculations, with- 
out the slightest attempt at those 
tender intimacies that are so dear 
to a woman in love. 

“What are these mysterious in- 
struments you are working on?” she 
asked. 

He smiled. “Read my mind and 
find out,” he challenged. 

“I wish I could,” she answered 
wistfully, and changed the subject. 
“Aren’t you afraid of being picked 
up some day? The entire police 
force is looking for you.” 

“I’ve fixed that. Only this morn- 
ing a cop stopped me. ‘Say,’ says 
he, ‘you’re Wentworth!’ I laughed 
in his face. ‘I’m not,’ I said. He 
had his hand out to grab me. He 
stopped it halfway, let it drop. And 
I just kept on walking.” 

“I wish it were all over, and we 
were all normal human beings 
again.” She sighed. 

At nine o’clock that night, a squad 

AST-7 



HE FROM PROCYON 



113 



of police broke into Doolittle’s 
apartment and yanked him away 
from his radio and evening newspa- 
per. He was too surprised and too 
habitually respectful of law and or- 
der in the form of brass buttons to 
object. If Maria had been home, 
things might have been different, 
but she had been called over to her 
mother, who was a hypochondriac 
and was always dying. 

Accordingly there was no diffi- 
culty about hauling him down to 
headquarters, to await disposition 
by Jordan. The steel door clanged 
on the bewildered little man with an 
ominous sound. 

The second squad ran into trouble. 
They found Alison La Rue in her 
sybaritic penthouse. Jordan had ex- 
pected some difficulty, so he had 
spoken to the squad for ten minutes 
before they went, to make sure his 
will would continue in effect. But 
he had overlooked the simplest lav/ 
of his strange power. 

“Come along, lady,” the lieuten- 
ant in charge said gruffly. “The 
commissioner wants to have a little 
talk with you.” 

“Got a warrant?” asked Alison. 

The policeman grinned. “Naw, 
don’t need any. Come along qui- 
etly, or your pretty face’ll get hurt.” 

She wrapped her negligee closer 
around her and defied them. “I 
ain’t going.” 

The five husky men paused un- 
certainly. The simple statement had 
been enough to counteract the re- 
cent impact of the commissioner’s 
will. 

The lieutenant realized his posi- 
tion was ticklish. No warrant and 
breaking into a private apartment 
spelled trouble, if the woman got 
herself a good lawyer. 

“Now listen, lady,” he pleaded. 

“I won’t,” she retorted violently. 

AST-8 



“I got rights, and a lawyer. I ain’t 
going and you can’t make me.” 

The police, all husky five of them, 
wilted under the overlaying influ- 
ence, became obedient automatons to 
her will. Had she then commanded 
them to kill each other forthwith, 
they would have done so under the 
compulsion. 

With meek rigidity they filed out, 
leaving her staring. Being dumb, 
she had not as yet quite realized 
what she possessed. Which was 
mighty lucky for the world. She 
actually attributed all of her suc- 
cess to her brilliancy as an actress 
and to her irresistible feminine ap- 
peal. 

At headquarters, Jordan first lis- 
tened incredulously to his returning 
cohorts, then broke into a fury of 
vituperation. Now that they were 
once more under his personal influ- 
ence, they were sheepish. 

“I dunno how it happened,” mut- 
tered the lieutenant, “but the mo- 
ment that dame said she wouldn’t 
go, it just seemed as if she was right 
about it.” 

Jordan controlled his raging tem- 
per in a hurry. He realized now the 
simple principle he had overlooked. 
He must be more careful in the fu- 
ture. 

“I’m going with you,” he said 
grimly. 

Alison drew herself up haughtily 
at this second intrusion, but this 
time her protests were unavailing. 
Her will power was diffuse, weak, 
as against the grim, concentrated 
force of the commissioner. She 
went, and the cell door banged on 
her, too. 

Anthony Marshall w r as nabbed at 
the home of one of his friends and, 
before he could protest, was gagged 
and blindfolded. Jordan v/as taking 
no chances on Tony’s awareness of 
the situation. 



114 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



“That’ll hold them,” the commis- 
sioner remarked with an air of sat- 
isfaction to Hollis as he personally 
locked the three great cell doors and 
pocketed the keys. “Put Moran in 
charge — he’s stone-deaf and near- 
sighted. They won’t be able to do 
a thing with him. He can feed them 
through the bars.” 

“What are you going to do with 
them?” 

Jordan shrugged. “Ought to kill 
’em off, I suppose. I will, if they 
make too much trouble. When 
things get set, though, I’ll call in a 
good surgeon, to operate. Went- 
worth said something about it.” 
“And Wentworth?” 

The commissioner’s face dark- 
ened. “When I get hold of him— — ” 
he said slowly, and said no more. It 
was not necessary. 

ALL THROUGH the night the 
city was a hive of secret prepara- 
tions. Ordinary good citizens went 
to bed unknowing what momentous 
changes were being prepared for 
their destinies, the destinies of the 
nation, the whole world in fact. 
Even Wentworth did not know. He 
was immersed in perfecting his ap- 
paratus. He did not dream that Jor- 
dan would act in such extreme haste. 

The 20th of November dawned 
cold and clear. Early risers, ready 
to resume the day’s monotonous 
round of duties, paused on front 
doorsteps and gasped. 

The streets of New York were 
flowing rivers of grim, armed men. 
Policemen, National Guards, fire- 
men, all with bright-blue arm bands, 
fully equipped with bayoneted rifles, 
ammunition belts ; machine-gun 
squads, motorized artillery, light 
tanks, roared and thundered through 
the narrow thoroughfares on their 
way to the appointed rendezvous. 
Every telephone exchange, cable 



office, railroad station, air field, radio 
station, every road, was policed, 
with strict orders to forbid all out- 
going traffic, all outgoing messages. 
Jordan was taking no chances on 
the news of his mobilization getting 
abroad. 

Wentworth was one of the early 
risers. He stepped unwitting 
down the brownstone stoop of his 
boarding house and was immediately 
shoved back by a raucous sergeant 
of police. 

“Get back in and stay in !” the red- 
faced cop yelled. “No one allowed 
out to-day.” 

The street was alive with the 
noise of marching men, the rumble 
of artillery, converging on Central 
Park. 

Wentworth was aghast. He ex- 
perienced a sinking sensation in the 
pit of his stomach. Blind fool that 
he was! Jordan had acted and 
caught him napping, unready. His 
apparatus was not yet complete. 
Jordan would strike, and win, be- 
fore he had a chance to move. 

“Get back, I told you!” The ser- 
geant snatched out a revolver, lev- 
eled it at him threateningly. 

Wentworth looked at the bluster- 
ing policeman. The blue arm band 
shone in the sun, so did the blued 
steel of the revolver. 

“You will let me pass,” he said 
coldly. “I am your superior; my 
will is your will.” 

The sergeant moved back a step, 
pocketed his gun, turned rigid. 

“Yes, sir,” he said tonelessly. 
“What are your commands?” 

“Go to your home, and stay there 
until I give you further orders.” 

“As you say, sir.” 

The man saluted, and plunged into 
the heaving stream of men and ma- 
terials, shouldering his way vio- 
lently against the moving current. 

It had worked. That meant the 



• HE FROM PROCYON 



115 



last imposing of will was the most 
effective. A wild hope darted 
through him. Suppose he were to 
appear boldly before the assembled 
troops, bind them to his loyalty 
rather than to Jordan’s. A moment’s 
reflection disabused him, however. 

There he would necessarily run 
into Jordan. It would be a battle 
of conflicting wills, and he knew 
Jordan’s was as determined as his. 
And Jordan’s influence had sunk in 
by repeated commands. He, Went- 
worth, would be killed before he 
had a chance to make the men even 
waver. 

The outlook was dark. Yet the 
first moment of despair soon passed. 
He must find Margaret, get hold of 
Dr. Knopf. Together they might 
find a way. 

First, Margaret. He plunged into 
the seething horde of men, stopped 
each angry growl, each threatening 
move his way, by cold, curt com- 
mands. He went further. He or- 
dered home those whose eye he 
could catch, and little groups of 
police dissociated themselves from 
the press, moved with rigid steps 
through their former comrades. A 
thin trickling of course that could 
have no appreciable effect on Jor- 
dan’s scheme. 

He found Margaret awake and 
pale. He did not interpret the glad 
little cry she gave at the sight of 
him, but hustled her out with hardly 
a word of explanation. Next he 
picked up Dr. Knopf. 

Outside, Wentworth calmly com- 
mandeered an official car, told the 
uniformed chauffeur to step out, 
and got behind the wheel. 

With the siren wide open, the 
heavy car roared through the 
crowded streets, heading for the 
Bronx. Men in uniform jumped for 
their lives, shouted angrily. Shots 
whizzed by, but their speed, and the 



wild confusion of their flight, saved 
them from harm. Once a battery of 
tanks blocked their way, but Went- 
worth leaned far out from his driv- 
er’s seat, Margaret leaned out to the 
right, and shouted simultaneously : 

“Pull aside ; give us room to pass.” 

The angry commander promptly 
obeyed; the tanks clambered up the 
curb onto the sidewalk, and the car 
whizzed through. In a little while 
they were free from the menace of 
Jordan’s henchmen. 

Hurry! Hurry! The thought 
hammered with insane repetition in 
Wentworth’s brain. He must com- 
plete his apparatus, get it to the 
field of operations, before it was too 
late. And the sinking feeling grew 
on him again. It was too late! 

They pulled up with a screaming 
of tortured brakes in front of the 
little shack that housed his equip- 
ment. Wentworth was out of the 
car before the wheels stopped roll- 
ing. 

Inside, not stopping to doff his 
coat, he plunged furiously into 
work, simultaneously issuing stac- 
cato commands to Knopf and Mar- 
garet. They brought him tools, 
spliced wires with eager, untrained 
fingers, noted meter readings, did 
everything they could to help. 

As they worked, Wentworth ex- 
plained what the apparatus was, 
what he intended to do with it. Sev- 
eral times he was puzzled, asked Dr. 
Knopf for advice. 

They raced against time, against 
the inevitable march of events. And 
still the machine was incomplete; 
vital parts, bits of vital theory even, 
as yet missing. 

“We can’t stop the beginning of 
this awful revolution.” Wentworth 
groaned, “but with uninterrupted 
work all day and to-night, maybe 
we’ll get finished in time to call a 
halt before it gets out of hand.” 



116 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Uninterrupted work, a bare day 
and a night, to save the world from 
a greater menace than Attila the 
Hun, Ghengis Khan, Timur the 
Lame, or Napoleon had ever been. 
A bare day and a night! Modest 
demand ! 

A BELATED policeman, on his 
way to a telephone exchange he 
should have contacted an hour be- 
fore, saw the official car stop at the 
seemingly deserted one-story 
wooden structure, saw the two men 
and the girl get out. They did not 
see him, and thus were unable to 
influence his decisions. He recog- 
nized Wentworth at once from the 
broadcast description. 

He did not stop. His orders were 
definite, inviolable, to proceed to the 
exchange. He had overslept. But 
immediately on arrival, he made con- 
nection with headquarters. 

“I want to speak with the chief,” 
he said. 

“Can’t,” said headquarters switch- 
board. “He’s left for the front.” 

“I must talk to him,” he insisted. 

“Don’t be a sap. I told you ” 

The policeman had an inspiration. 
“O. K. Hollis there?” 

“Yes.” 

“Fine! Put him on.” 

Hollis was impatient. “What in 
hell d’you want? I’m late for the 
chief now.” 

“Listen, Mr. Hollis,” the officer’s 
voice was ingratiating. “When he 
hears the news, he won’t mind your 
being late. An’ put in a good word 
for me, too.” 

“Spill it without so much chat- 
ter.” 

“I found Wentworth’s hideout.” 

“Wha-a-at?” 

“I knew you’d be surprised,” said 
the policeman happily. “Here’s the 
dope ” 



VI. 

THE MALL in Central Park was 
in full panoply of war. Fifty thou- 
sand men surged in serried rows 
over the vast expanse. Twenty-five 
thousand police, ten thousand fire- 
men, and fifteen thousand National 
Guards, wearing the blue band, pre- 
senting government rifles to the glis- 
tening sunlight. 

Jordan stood on the raised plat- 
form, gratified. At his side were 
the mayor and governor, wan im- 
ages of their former selves. His 
will was their will. 

He raised his hand for silence. A 
hush, deeper than that of death, fell 
on the multitude. He spoke, pro- 
jecting his commands through a 
loud-speaker system, so that the 
farthest trooper could hear and be 
impregnated with his will. 

“Bluebands!” he orated. “I am 
your leader and you are my men.” 

The troops roared their approval. 

“The world has long waited for 
us!” Jordan shouted. “Fools and 
idiots have ruled it long enough. It 
is time for them to go. What this 
country needs, what the world 
needs, is a strong man, a dictator, 
who is ruthless and hard, and can 
impose his will. I am that man; I, 
Alfred Jordan.” 

“Jordan, Jordan!” they yelled in 
unison, not knowing why, knowing 
only that they must. 

“The President of the United 
States, Congress, all of them must 
go. They are weaklings. You, with 
myself at your head, will let noth- 
ing stand in our way. If there is 
opposition, if the enemy persuade 
deluded fools to bar your path, you 
will brush them aside ; you will kill. 

“We march on Washington at 
once. Company commanders, order 
your men to fall in. Take charge. 



HE FROM PROCYON 



117 



Remember, my will in all things is 
your will. Repeat that.” 

The terrible phrase parroted back 
in a thunder of sound. Like an in- 
sidious opiate it penetrated the most 
secret cells of the assemblage, mak- 
ing them mere tools fashioned to the 
hand of Jordan. He himself felt 
the powerful outpouring of radiant 
energy from his brain. It exalted 
him, made him feel like a god. 

Battalion after battalion swung 
around in military precision, passed 
the speaker’s stand, saluted, and 
marched west through the park, to- 
ward Pennsylvania Station, on to 
destiny. 

Jordan waited. When the last bat- 
talion was on the move, he would 
catch up in the armored car appro- 
priated to his use. 

His quick eye caught an eddy of 
movement through the last section 
of marching men, a wave that rippled 
toward him to the accompaniment 
of angry noises. It was Hollis, com- 
ing through on the run, hatless, 
panting. 

“What’s the matter?” Jordan 
asked quickly. His first thought was 
that his prisoners had escaped. 

“Wentworth!” 

Jordan groaned. “You mean ” 

“I know where he is. Patrolman 
Caffrey discovered him. It’s in the 
Bronx, on Southern Boulevard.” 

The commissioner jerked forward. 
His eyes flamed. The last menace 
to his bid for world dominion would 
soon be in his hands. 

“Quick!” He spoke rapidly. 
“Grab five squad cars, take a com- 
pany of men. We’re going up there 
to nab him.” 

“But, chief, you can’t go,” Hollis 
protested. “The Bluebands will be 
entraining in half an hour.” 

Jordan swore. Hollis was right. 
Another limitation to the gift. Once 
out of his personal influence, there 



was no telling what the army might 
do in the face of opposition, of other 
forces. Perhaps some one else, un- 
known to him, also was in posses- 
sion of the secret power. 

“But, damn it!” he cried. “Unless 
I go along, they’ll never be able to 
take Wentworth. He knows what 
it’s all about.” 

Then Hollis had a brilliant idea. 
“Why not shoot right down to the 
Tombs and talk to Marshall? I’m 
sure you can convince him to play 
along with you. It’ll be to his ad- 
vantage. He can take care of Went- 
worth. Afterward you should be 
able to handle Marshall.” 

Jordan’s face cleared at once. He 
shook his secretary’s hand enthusi- 
astically. 

“Hollis, you have brains. Hold a 
company to follow him after Went- 
worth. I’m on my way.” 

Ten minutes later Jordan was in 
Anthony Marshall’s cell, talking ear- 
nestly. 

THE MIDDLE-AGED clubman 
had been indignant, surprised, 
frightfully scared, all in turn. The 
sudden, unexplained arrest, the sum- 
mary incarceration, broke his spirit. 
He tried to talk to his lone jailer, 
to persuade him to let him out, but 
the man was deaf, couldn’t even see 
the movement of his lips through 
the bars. Breakfast was silently 
thrust into the cell. He looked at 
the coarse food and shuddered. He 
did not eat it. 

Jordan said: “I’m giving you a 

break, Marshall. Refuse, and it’s 
the last thing you’ll ever do on this 
earth.” 

Tony Marshall had no thought of 
refusing. “I’ll do anything,” he as- 
sented eagerly. “But what? I don’t 
understand.” 

“I’ll tell you.” Jordan had de- 
cided on his story. “A scientist 



113 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



friend of mine stumbled on the se- 
cret of complete hypnotism. He ex- 
perimented on me. It took. Then 
he tried it out in the street, on a 
few people, from a distance. You 
were one of them. Because it 
wasn’t under laboratory conditions 
the power he gave you was much 
weaker than mine. You under- 
stand?” 

Tony nodded weakly. With Jor- 
dan’s fierce gaze bent upon him, and 
the calamitous situation he was in, 
it seemed quite probable. 

Satisfied, Jordan continued: “My 
friend died. Certain things hap- 
pened. More are on their way. I 
rounded up all the people he had 
experimented on, except one. That 
one, a chap named Craig Went- 
worth, got away. He knows the se- 
cret, is hunting for the others him- 
self. He wants to operate on them, 
make permanent imbeciles of them 
for life, so he can be the only one 
in the field.” 

Marshall’s gasp of horror was 
music. 

“I’ve located him finally. I’d go 
for him myself, but other matters 
are waiting. Here’s your chance, 
Marshall. Get him; bind, gag, and 
blindfold him, and bring him to me, 
and you’re made. I’ll appoint you 
my chief assistant; together we’ll 
rule the country. If you don’t ” 

“I’ll do it, Mr. Commissioner!” 
Tony cried eagerly. 

“O. K. A company of soldiers will 
go with you. Now this is what you 
have to do.” 

CRAIG WENTWORTH was 
stumped. He stared at the almost 
complete bit of apparatus, frown- 
ing, his brow corrugated into in- 
numerable tiny wrinkles. 

“What’s the matter, Craig?” Mar- 
garet asked anxiously. 

He groaned. “The very last item. 



and I can’t seem to make it click. 
Maybe you can help, Dr. Knopf. It’s 
more a physiological problem than a 
physical.” 

It was the question of the last 
step; the hitching of the apparatus 
in some way to the queer, other- 
universe globule radiating away in- 
side the brain. 

Dr. Knopf thought deeply. “I 
wouldn’t chance connecting it there. 
We know nothing about its consti- 
tution — disaster might be the result. 
But I do know about the pineal 
body, and I can guess why the glob- 
ule was connected to that particular 
organ. If my theory is correct, you 
can achieve the same result by cut- 
ting your little machine in there.” 

Wentworth shouted: “We’ll do 

it, then! That simplifies matters. 
Just a few more wires and we’re 
through.” 

Margaret roused. “You mean 
you’re going to insert that thing into 
your brain?” 

“Not all of it. Just the wires. 
The apparatus itself will be strapped 
to my chest.” 

She was horrified. “That means 
an operation; danger. I won’t have 
it, I tell you!” Her bosom heaved, 
she was panting. 

Wentworth grinned down at her. 
“Dr. Knopf is a good doctor. He’ll 
do it in a jiffy, like snatching out a 
tonsil. Don’t worry. Let’s get 
started.” 

But there was no further starting 
just then. 

The door swung open with a 
crash. Wentworth whirled, saw the 
flood of bluebanded men pouring in 
like a resistless tide. In the split 
second left him, he recognized their 
leader. He was Anthony Marshall. 

He opened his mouth to yell an 
order, a command, compelling these 
men under his will. It was too late. 

The foremost were upon him, gun 



HE FROM PROCYON 













His amplified voice penetrated to the last ranks, and the 
reaction was instantaneous — and incredible! 




120 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



butts swinging. He tried to dodge, 
swerved, saw Knopf and Margaret 
go down under a huddle of men, 
cried “Stop!” and crashed headlong 
into a shower of explosive stars. 
The floor heaved once, and subsided 
into dead blackness. 

WASHINGTON was amazed. As 
yet there was no panic. That would 
come later. The president and his 
cabinet were in session. With them 
was General Collins, the head of the 
American forces. 

“I can’t quite understand it, gen- 
tlemen,” the president acknowl- 
edged. “It’s incredible. A revolt 
against the United States to start 
just like that, without warning, 
without preliminaries, without 
rhyme or reason.” 

“Stranger things have happened 
all through history,” said the sec- 
retary of state quietly. He turned 
to the chief of the secret service. 
“What information have you on it, 
Jones?” 

“Little enough,” he said. “Got a 
hundred men in New York and only 
one came through with a report, 
some twenty minutes ago. Claimed 
he had no warning. Early this 
morning the police and National 
Guard took possession, closed all 
avenues of escape. He managed 
finally to sneak through the lines 
into Westchester, and got to a 
phone. Says it seems to be headed 
by the police commissioner himself, 
a man named Alfred Jordan. Talk 
is that the mayor of the city and the 
governor of the State are backing 
him.” 

The president frowned. “It’s un- 
heard-of. A city and a State defy- 
ing the whole country. Sounds like 
comic opera. The mayor I don’t 
know personally — he’s just a time- 
serving politician. But the governor 
is a personal friend of mine, a man 



of intelligence. How did he get 
mixed up in this?” 

“There’s something in back of 
this,” observed the secretary of 
state. “We’ll have trouble, I’m 
afraid.” 

The general roused himself. 
“Nonsense. The president is right. 
It is comic opera. I’ve mobilized 
all the regular-army units in a radius 
of two hundred miles. They’re en- 
training now. Within three hours 
I’ll have twenty thousand men to 
meet the rebels.” 

“They have fifty thousand,” the 
secretary of war interjected. 

“My men are trained soldiers,” the 
general said rather contemptuously. 
“They’ll go through them like a hur- 
ricane.” He looked at the map 
stretched out before him on the ta- 
ble. “They’ll contact somewhere 
around Wilmington. I’ve already 
ordered General Harper there to 
take command. He’s an excellent 
soldier.” 

The president’s private telephone 
rang. He reached out and picked 
up the receiver. 

“Yes; it’s the president. Who? 
Who wants to talk to me? Alfred 
Jordan the First, Commander of the 
Bluebands. The man is crazy. 
What’s that, he insists?” 

The president’s ordinarily kindly 
features set in grim hard lines. 
“Very well, put him on.” 

The secretary of state reached 
over and did a surprising thing. He 
unceremoniously jerked the receiver 
away from the president’s ear, 
clapped it to his own. He stopped 
the angry exclamation of the star- 
tled chief executive with an up- 
raised hand. 

“Let me handle this call, please,” 
he said quietly. “I think it’s going 
to be dangerous to the man on the 
receiving end.” 

Jones, the secret-service man, 



HE FROM PROCYON 



121 



acted quickly. He in turn tore the 
receiver away, lifted it. 

“If it’s danger, that’s my job,” he 
said. “Hello, hello — yes; this is the 
president talking. What do you 
want? Oh, you don’t recognize the 
voice? Well, I have a bad cold.” 

THERE WAS a long silence; evi- 
dently Jordan at the other end was 
saying things. The breathless as- 
semblage could see the drops of per- 
spiration start up on Jones’ fore- 
head, the strange rigidity that over- 
came his features. 

“Yes, sir, Commander Jordan,” he 
said finally. His voice was respect- 
ful. “I’ll do that, at once, sir.” 
Jones turned and stared straight 
in front of him. “He wishes to talk 
to the president. He has an impor- 
tant message. I would strongly ad- 
vise, sir, that you speak to him.” 
The president, his mind a trifle be- 
clouded by the anxiety of the situa- 
tion, had not noticed any untoward 
change in the head of the secret 
service. “All right,” he said, “I’ll 
talk to the madman.” 

The secretary of state caught his 
arm in time. “Don’t you see, Mr. 
President,” he cried, “how right I 
was? Look at Jones.” 

That focused attention. Jones 
was rigid, spoke almost like a 
wound-up mechanism. 

“Nothing the matter with me. 
Commander Jordan is a great man. 
You must listen to him. Here!” 
He moved suddenly, thrust the re- 
ceiver forcibly against the astounded 
president’s ear, shouted hoarsely 
into the mouthpiece. 

“Talk to him now, commander. 
He’s on.” 

The secretary of state was on his 
feet like a flash and lunged. He 
caught Jones off balance, sent him 
crashing against the table. In the 
same movement, the secretary 



scooped up the receiver, ripped vio- 
lently. The cord tore loose. The 
connection went dead. 

Every one was on his feet now. 
There was hubbub, excitement. The 
secret-service chief righted himself, 
and his hand went to his pocket. 

“Grab him !” shouted the secretary 
of state. “He’s going to shoot.” 

General Collins pinioned his arms 
as the door guard rushed in. The 
gun was quickly removed, and Jones 
held panting, helpless, glaring. 

“There’s the answer,” said the sec- 
retary of state, pointing to the rene- 
gade. “I knew there was something 
smelly about the whole revolt, about 
that telephone call. The man Jor- 
dan is a hypnotist, of supernormal 
powers. He has hypnotized a whole 
city into following him. He just 
did the same with Jones over the 
phone. He would have done the 
same with you, Mr. President, had 
you answered the call, and the sound 
of his voice reached you.” 

The president acted decisively. 
“Remove Jones to a hospital, give 
him the best of care, but guard him 
closely, day and night. Have doc- 
tors and psychologists examine him, 
try to get him out of his state. Have 
them report to us at once.” 

Within two hours the report was 
duly rendered, signed by the fore- 
most medical men in Washington. 

“We find,” it read, “that Emmet 
Jones is suffering from a strange 
form of induced hypnosis. Contrary 
to the ordinary states, he is abso- 
lutely normal in every particular — 
pulse, respiration, blood pressure, 
processes of thought and action, ex- 
cept in an expressed and fanatic be- 
lief in one Alfred Jordan and an 
avowed intention to kidnap or kill 
the President of the United States. 
All efforts to rid him of his induced 
complex have thus far been un- 



122 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



availing. Further reports will fol- 
low.” 

But by the time the message was 
in the hands of the cabinet, it at- 
tracted only cursory attention. 
Other and far more alarming news 
had come through. 

VII. 

BATTLE WAS joined a few 
miles north of Wilmington. At that 
point the troop trains commandeered 
by Jordan were compelled to halt. 
The first contingents of the regular 
army had torn up the tracks. 

The assorted motley of Bluebands 
detrained at once, drew up in a sem- 
blance of battle array. The tanks 
were hauled off flat cars, so was the 
motorized artillery. 

The scouting party of regulars 
dropped a few shots among them to 
harass the unloading, and withdrew 
to the main body, resting behind a 
line of shallow, hastily dug trenches. 

Jordan, his step firm, his ego im- 
possibly inflated, entered an in- 
closed armored car. On the steel- 
plated top protruded a series of tiny 
cones. The tanks lined up on either 
side. In the rear the artillery swung 
into position, ammunition dumps 
were set up. Officers of the National 
Guard, artillery corps, plotted para- 
bolas and arcs of fire. 

A salvo was fired. It sailed high 
over the regulars’ entrenchments. It 
took time to plot correction data. 
In the meantime the regulars re- 
turned the favor. The first burst 
smacked with earth-shattering con- 
cussion not a hundred yards in 
front. Flying clods and bits of 
shrapnel burst among them. Three 
men were killed outright, a number 
wounded. 

The Bluebands were ready now. 
They responded with all guns. This 
time they were short, by three hun- 



dred yards. Almost on the heels of 
the detonations came the echoing an- 
swer. It came on with the roar of a 
thousand express trains. It crashed 
into the middle ranks, tearing great 
gaps in the compact masses. 

“We’re licked if we stay here,” 
said Hollis. “Our artillery is no 
match for theirs.” 

Jordan heaved out of the car, in 
full sight of all his men. 

“We attack at once!” he shouted. 
“We are stronger than the enemy; 
they can’t stop us. There must be 
no retreat. Forward, on to vic- 
tory!” 

They cheered, not wildly, not en- 
thusiastically, but with a strange, 
deadly monotone. Then they surged 
forward. 

Jordan was in the car again. The 
line of tanks lumbered over the un- 
even terrain. The defending artil- 
lery lessened its range, -smashed 
again and again into the attacking 
force. But the ranks closed up and 
went on, under driving compulsion. 
Terror was not in them, nothing but 
a hypnotic setness of purpose. Only 
death or crippling wounds could 
stop them. 

At five hundred yards the en- 
trenched infantry opened up, with 
concerted rifle blasts and the deadly 
rat-a-tat of machine guns. The field 
was reaped by an invisible scythe. 
Men slipped and staggered in the 
blood of their fellows, and went on. 
Whole companies were wiped out 
of existence ; others took their 
places. A quarter of the tanks were 
disabled; the others rumbled on. 

Then the trenches vomited forth 
men, line after line of them. A great 
cheer swept their ranks. They came 
forward on the double-quick, in 
open array. The sun spattered daz- 
zlingly on leveled bayonets. The 
defending army was attacking. 



HE FROM PROCYON 



123 



“We’ll never hold them, sir,” said 
Hollis. 

Jordan’s face was exalted with 
passion. He was beyond doubt of 
his powers. He forked a tiny switch, 
and spoke in normal, ordinary, 
everyday tones. 

OUTSIDE, a volume of sound 
blasted from the tiny cones on the 
top of the car — sounds that were 
overpowering in their mightiness, 
yet clear as any bell, every syllable 
separate and distinct. It poured 
forth, met and muted the hellish 
concussion of noise inherent in gun- 
fire and human shoutings. It over- 
whelmed the battle, seethed artillery 
itself down to a forgotten whisper. 
All the earth seemed to be waiting, 
listening in terrified silence. 

“Soldiers of the United States 
army, stop; cease fighting! It is I 
who command you, your leader, Al- 
fred Jordan the First, Dictator of 
the United States. Drop your arms 
at once, surrender ; yield to my will 
in all things!” 

The blast of sound penetrated to 
the last ranks, to the entrenched ar- 
tillery. 

The reaction was remarkable, in- 
stantaneous. The attacking forces 
paused almost in mid-stride, held 
rigid by indescribable forces. The 
weapons, deadly in intent, dropped 
from unresisting fingers. Their 
hands moved slowly up into the air, 
in token of surrender. Gunners, 
about to press electrical connections 
that would fire the belching mon- 
sters, paused bewildered, moved 
hands back to sides. The battle was 
over. At the moment of victory, the 
regular army had succumbed to a 
force they did not even recognize. 

Alfred Jordan had won his first 
great victory. He had proved his 
powers on the largest scale. Al- 
ready he envisaged himself the dic- 



tator of the Earth, already he sighed 
in anticipation, because, like Alex- 
ander, he would soon have no more 
worlds to conquer. 

“Wonderful!” breathed Hollis, so 
excited he could hardly form sylla- 
bles. “That loud-speaker system 
is— — ” 

“A matter of being prepared. 
Rounded up every sound engineer 
in New York; gave them three days 
to evolve a super-sound magnifier. 
They did it.” 

Within two hours the victorious 
Bluebands were in Washington; 
their original depleted forces aug- 
mented by the regular army that had 
been sent out to oppose them. Even 
a squadron of planes, fast bombers, 
could not zoom high enough to 
escape the tremendously enlarged 
sound of Jordan’s voice. Like so 
many harmless birds, they settled 
meekly to the ground, and their pi- 
lots turned into henchmen of the 
new dictator. 

Washington was defenseless. The 
president and his cabinet fled hast- 
ily. So did members of Congress, 
and all officialdom. The city was in 
a state of terror. Refugees blocked 
all roads leading south. Those who 
could not escape cowered in their 
cellars, fearing the worst. 

But Jordan, in spite of his megalo- 
mania, was no fool. He gave strict 
orders that there were to be no ex- 
cesses ; that discipline was to remain 
intact; that no inhabitants or their 
property were to be in any wise dis- 
turbed. He needed Washington 
whole for his purposes. 

And, having the most unusual 
army in the world, one that was 
wholly and completely subservient 
to the will of its commander, there 
were no infractions. 

THE EVENTS that shook the 
world on that fateful day of No- 



124 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



vember 20th meant nothing to 
Charles Doolittle. No echoes of 
their shattering importance entered 
the monotony of his cell. His ar- 
rest and violent incarceration be- 
wildered him. What had he done; 
what sin against society had he com- 
mitted? He racked his brains for 
the answer. He asked the fumbling 
jailer who slid food between the 
bars and withdrew. But the man 
was stone-deaf. His sleep was un- 
easy, made terrible with nightmares 
involving Maria, drowned, bloated 
bodies and a sharp-bladed guillo- 
tine. 

In the morning the cell next him 
burst into furious life. It was a 
woman obviously, but a woman with 
a command of picturesque, vitriolic 
language that held Doolittle at once 
gasping and semi-admiring. Alison 
La Rue had reverted to Alice Jones, 
daughter of a longshoreman, and 
was telling the world about it. 

Doolittle coughed hesitantly. It 
seemed to him that the woman was 
becoming a bit too descriptive in 
her delineations of her persecutors. 
The monologue ended abruptly. 

“Who’s there?” she demanded 
quickly. 

“Only Charles Doolittle,” he an- 
swered meekly. 

“And who in blazes is Charles 
Doolittle?” 

He coughed. “A criminal, I’m 
afraid.” 

“Oh!” She was disgusted. The 
inmate of a cell would hardly be in 
a position to help her get out. Then 
feminine curiosity got the better of 
her. 

“What did you do?” 

“Nothing that I know of.” 

“Then why are you here?” 

“The police came and took me last 
night. Wouldn’t tell me why.” 

“Sa-ay, that sounds like my story. 
Only they had to bring the com- 



mish to pull me in. There’s some- 
thing screwy about this. I yell for 
my lawyer and nobody gives me a 
tumble. The guy what brings the 
tripe they call food can’t hear a 
thing. Don’t seem to be any one 
else in this jail. I’xn going to yell 
again. I know my rights.” 

The cavernous steel walls echoed 
with her screams, but frightening 
quiet followed close on the last rum- 
ble. No one came. She did not try 
it again. They talked in low, hushed 
tones — the little, inoffensive bank 
clerk and the gorgeous, preening 
creature in the next cell. As the 
shadows lengthened in the gloomy 
corridor, a certain intimacy had 
been established between them, 
these two ill-assorted companions in 
misfortune. The deaf, nearsighted 
jailer came on ghostly feet with 
their apology for a supper, withdrew 
like a wraith. This time they ate; 
hunger spread its mantle of illusion 
over the coarse fare. That night 
sleep was sound. 

On the morning of the 21st, Jor- 
dan, installed in triumph in Wash- 
ington, thought of his captives. He 
called in Hollis. 

“Wire New York,” he ordered. 
“Have Moran bind and gag them 
thoroughly, and ship them here in a 
separate closed train. Impress on 
headquarters that in no circumstance 
is any one to approach them, except 
Moran. I’m sending the key by 
plane. Any word from Marshall?” 

“No, chief.” 

Jordan’s face darkened. “The 
double-crossing rat! Order a squad 
up to the Bronx to trail him. No; 
don’t do that. If Marshall’s actu- 
ally double crossing, he’ll make 
them his puppets. I told him too 
damn much. Just as soon as I clear 
up things here, I’ll go to New York 
myself.” 

It turned out to be unnecessary, 



HE FROM PROCYON 



125 



however. New York was coming to 
Washington. 

AT TEN O’CLOCK on the morn- 
ing of the 22nd, Moran entered the 
cell of Doolittle and proceeded to 
bind him expertly, thrusting a gag 
into terrified jaws. 

Alison was harder. She bit and 
fought and scratched and screamed. 
Moran’s face, by the time he was 
finished, was scored with deep, rak- 
ing slashes. A closed, windowless 
prison van backed to the gates ; two 
silent, trussed figures were thrust 
inside. The police van sped to 
Pennsylvania Station where a spe- 
cial train was waiting. The prison- 
ers were bundled into a private car, 
still in silence, the door locked from 
the inside by Moran, the only other 
occupant. 

The train snorted several times 
and hummed through the tunnel. It 
devoured the long, shining rails to 
Washington. Moran sat and glared 
malevolently at his captives, nursing 
his wounded face. 

This side of Wilmington, some- 
thing happened. The torn-up tracks 
had been repaired, but some one had 
been careless. Several spikes were 
loose in their sockets, had wabbled 
more and more with each vibrating 
train. 

As the special hit the weakened 
spot, two spikes snapped, the rails 
spread wide, and the fast-roaring 
train went plowing its way through 
still-bloodied fields. The engineer 
and fireman were instantly killed; 
the little group of Bluebands in the 
first car were ground into the very 
fabric of the telescoped shell. 

The second car, containing Moran 
and the prisoners, dug itself into the 
ground, and burst into flames. There 
were several farmhouses some dis- 
tance away, whose occupants, fright- 
ened away at the first mobilization 



of the opposing armies, had timidly 
returned the night before. 

“Glory be!” said the grizzled 
farmer to his thin-lipped wife. “If 
it ain’t one thing, it’s another. Git 
some hot coffee an’ blankets ready. 
Maybe some un’s alive out there.” 

He grabbed tools and rushed to 
the flaming wreck. The first car he 
saw at once was hopeless. The fire 
in the second was gathering head- 
way. With pick and crowbar he 
smashed several windows of the 
overturned car. He crawled in, 
gasping in the hot atmosphere. 
Tongues of fire lashed out at him. 

In one corner lay a man, his head 
lolling. The angle was such as 
could only mean a broken neck. 
Near where he stood, however, lay 
two figures, bundled and silent. Ex- 
erting all his strength, he dragged 
them out, went back for the third. 
It was too late ; a blast of flame 
swept through the car as though it 
were a chimney, driving him back 
with singed beard. 

His neighbor came running up, 
breathless with excitement. “Lord, 
Tom, sure is a mess! Save any 
one?” 

Tom wiped his blackened face, 
coughed the smoke out of his lungs. 
“Only these two; others all dead, 
I reck’n.” 

The neighbor gasped. “By 
crickety; they’re all trussed up.” 

Tom stared. “So they be. I 
never noticed. Here, give a hand, 
Bill.” 

He knelt at Alison’s side, whipped 
out a stout jackknife, and sawed at 
her bonds. Bill worked on Doo- 
little. 

That evening the two escaped 
prisoners from the train wreck were 
able to take an interest in their sur- 
roundings once more. Fortunately 
their injuries were not severe; it 
had been the smoke that had 



126 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



knocked them out more than any- 
thing else. From the kind-hearted 
inhabitants of the farmhouse, who, 
incidentally, bowed to their slight- 
est demands, they learned the story 
of the incredible events of the pre- 
ceding two days, of Jordan and his 
spectacular coup against the 
country. 

They reacted in different ways. 
Alison hated the man and at the 
same time he piqued her interest. 
A vague notion formulated in her 
mind; to proceed to Washington 
and pit her charms against the new 
dictator. If she could enmesh him 
with her fascinations, it would be 
revenge enough for the treatment he 
had meted out to her, and — wife of 
the dictator of the United States 
sounded sweet in her ears. 

As for Doolittle, he had but one 
ruling thought. He wanted to get 
back to Maria and to his secure lit- 
tle niche in the bank and his petty 
circle of friends. The events of the 
past several days bewildered — more, 
they frightened him. But he real- 
ized that the way back to New York 
was blocked. Washington was close 
at hand, and connections might be 
easier to make from there. Accord- 
ingly it was determined that they 
would sleep at the farmhouse and 
proceed the following morning. 

VIII. 

CRAIG WENTWORTH awoke 
with a splitting headache. The 
world whirled around with tremen- 
dous velocity, and his head went 
with it. At length the dizzying circle 
slowed down sufficiently for him to 
see that he was propped against the 
wall in a strange room, and his arms 
and legs felt terribly cramped. 
There was good reason fo* this — 
they were tightly bound — and also 
for the dry, stuffy sensation in his 



mouth. There was a gag rammed 
into it. 

His head rolled weakly. On one 
side of him, stiff and silent, a huge 
welt across his forehead, was Dr. 
Knopf, propped at a precarious an- 
gle. On the other, Margaret Sim- 
mons, pale and drawn, was watch- 
ing him with terrible anxiety. Both 
were bound, but not gagged. 

Wentworth blinked and looked at 
the others in the room. Anthony 
Marshall sat in the only chair in the 
room, his legs crossed, and smoked 
a long cigarette delicately through 
a still longer holder. A dozen Blue- 
bands were like so many statues 
along the walls, blank-staring, rifles 
grounded in front of them. 

“Came out of it finally, Went- 
worth, eh?” Tony observed comfort- 
ably. 

Wentworth made helpless mo- 
tions with his head. 

Margaret was about to burst out 
into passionate speech, but Went- 
worth sent a silent warning look 
across to her. She understood and 
held her tongue. It would not do 
to warn Marshall that she, too, was 
possessed of the power. 

“All right, men,” said Marshall. 
“Go into the other room, close the 
door and wait for me. In no cir- 
cumstances are you to do anything 
else, d’you understand?” 

The Bluebands nodded silently 
and clumped out. Tony made sure 
the door was secure, and came over 
to Wentworth. 

Margaret cried out: “Don’t hurt 

him!” 

Knopf sat silent and rigid — a com- 
pound of hurt head and the will of 
Marshall. 

Tony grinned and removed the 
gag from Wentworth’s mouth. 

“The lady takes a deep interest in 
you, eh, Wentworth?” 

Margaret went fiery red and said 



HE FROM PROCYON 



127 



no more. Wentworth, manlike, was 
startled. Vague, not unpleasant, 
thoughts scurried through his mind, 
but the sight of Tony in front of 
him forced him back to the more 
vital issues. He spat the cloying 
taste of the wadding out of his 
mouth. 

“I see,” he said bitterly, “you’ve 
joined up with Jordan.” 

“Well,” Marshall looked at the ash 
on his cigarette with critical eye, 
“that’s better than being made into 
an imbecile, isn’t it?” 

“What do you mean?” 

Tony stubbed out his cigarette, 
and lighted another before replying. 
" You ought to know. It was your 
idea in the first place.” 

“Oh!” Wentworth saw it now. 
“So that’s what Jordan told you.” 
Marshall leaned forward. “Isn’t 
it so?” 

“A trifle distorted,” Wentworth 
told him calmly. “I simply realized 
that a few of us had become involved 
with a most dangerous power — a 
power that you can already see has 
led to disastrous consequences, and 
will lead to much worse before long. 
The operation I suggested, I have 
been assured by competent medical 
authority, is a simple one. It will 
remove the fatal gift without the 
slightest harm to all our normal 
functions. I shall submit to the 
operation voluntarily.” 

Tony Marshall’s eyes glittered. 
“Listen to me, Wentworth.” His 
voice was hard. “I don’t intend be- 
ing operated on, no matter how safe 
or simple it may be. In the first 
place I don’t like operations. In 
the second, this gift, or whatever 
it is, pleases me immensely. I lived 
by my wits long enough, and I’ve 
had enough of that. I like money, 
I like pretty girls, I like food and 
wine and fine clothes and all the 
luxuries that are now at my com- 



mand. I’m not young any more, and 
I’m not that big enough of a fool 
to think that a beautiful girl will 
love me for myself alone. No, sir, 
just forget that part of it. I’m not 
giving up.” 

“You’ve teamed up with Jordan,” 
said Craig. “You think he will 
share with you?” 

Tony chuckled. “I don’t. He 
must take me for a sucker. Of 
course I pretended I’d play along 
with him. I had to; he had me at 
his mercy. But now — I have my 
own ideas.” 

He leaned back in his chair, let 
the smoke dribble out of his mouth. 

“I’ll make you an offer,” he said 
suddenly. “I can tell a straight chap 
when I see him. Play along with 
me, give me your word of honor 
you’ll obey me, and I’ll release you. 
Together we could wipe out Jordan, 
and take his place.” 

Wentworth shook his head. 
“Sorry ! The only way I’ll play will 
be to get rid of this menace from 
the world. That means ” 

Tony said regretfully: “Too 

bad ! I’ll go ahead on my own, then. 
As for you, think it over. I’ll give 
you twenty-four hours. If you’re 
still stubborn, I’ll have to get rid 
of you.” 

Wentworth looked at him with 
steady eyes. “At least release my 
two friends,” he said. “They are 
harmless.” 

“No can do. They know too much. 
What goes for you, goes for them. 
So think hard.” 

He got up, shoved the gag back 
in his prisoner’s mouth. 

“I’ve got things to do. In the 
meantime, don’t try to escape. The 
troops have orders to shoot at the 
slightest movement. I have them 
under my personal control. And 
your gag will hold.” 

He went quickly out of the room, 



126 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



and the Bluebands filed in, taking 
their stations with rigid faces. The 
door slammed. 

Margaret whispered eagerly: 
“Shall I order them now?” 

Wentworth shook his head. Mar- 
shall was still around, possibly. Dr. 
Knopf opened his eyes and groaned. 

“Oh, my head! Where — where 

are we?” 

Margaret said softly across Went- 
worth: “Take it easy, doctor. 

You’ll be all right soon.” 

The Bluebands rested on the ri- 
fles, silent, blank-faced. The min- 
utes crawled with leaden feet. 

AT LAST Wentworth thought it 
was safe to act. He nodded, once. 

Margaret spoke: “Men,” she said 
sharply, “untie the three of us, at 
once.” 

A wind ruffled through a dozen 
minds, cleansing them of old com- 
pulsions, overlaying new and there- 
fore more powerful influences. 

They jerked under the impact of 
her will, moved like automatons. 
Rifles clattered to the floor, clumsy 
fingers fumbled at knots. In a few 
minutes they were free, stamping to 
regain cramped circulation. 

Margaret indicated the men, stiff 
at attention. 

“What shall we do with them?” 

“Go home!” commanded Went- 
worth. “Forget everything about 
this affair.” 

As one, the dozen wheeled and 
clumped heavily out of the room. 

The three followed. Marshall was 
nowhere in sight, and the Bluebands 
were streaming out of the front 
door. They were in the front of a 
vacant store. 

“We’ve got to get back to the 
laboratory,” said Wentworth. 

The street was deserted. All New 
York remained locked up in their 
houses, frightened, until the com- 



pelling broadcast forced them out 
into the open. 

The street sign on the corner said 
Zerega Avenue. That meant they 
were about five miles away from the 
laboratory on Southern Boulevard. 

Dr. Knopf groaned. “We’ll have 
to walk. And I have lumbago.” 

“The trouble with doctors is that 
there are too many taxis in New 
York. Walk! It will do you good.” 

They walked. On Tremont Ave- 
nue fortune favored them. An auto- 
mobile parked at the curb had the 
ignition key in the lock. A minute 
later they were hurtling through 
ominously silent, deserted thorough- 
fares. 

Wentworth dived into his labora- 
tory with a hammering heart. He 
feared the worst; yet the realiza- 
tion struck him like a physical blow. 
The place had been seemingly left 
untouched, but the precious appara- 
tus was gone. They searched fran- 
tically, overturning equipment in 
their mad haste, but there was no 
sign of it. 

“Now what,” asked Dr. Knopf, 
“could Marshall have wanted with 
that? He didn’t know what it was 
for.” 

“He’s no fool,” said Wentworth in 
bitter tones. “He knew I was work- 
ing on something here, and the in- 
strument surely looked mysterious 
enough.” 

Margaret cried suddenly: “Sup- 

pose he uses it.” 

A shocked silence followed. Each 
tried to visualize what would hap- 
pen. 

Then Wentworth laughed shakily. 
“He wouldn’t know what it was all 
about. Besides, it wasn’t finished.” 

Dr. Knopf said coldly: “He has 

the power to command the advice 
and services of the greatest physi- 
cists and neurologists.” 

“We’ll have to stop him before 

AST— 8 



HE FROM PROCYON 



129 



he gets to them, then,” said Went- 
worth with determination. 

“How about Jordan?” asked Mar- 
garet. 

“Heaven only knows what’s hap- 
pened so far. It’s getting compli- 
cated, this mess.” 

There was a radio in the corner. 
Wentworth tuned in, twisting the 
dial from station to station. It was 
dead. 

“Come on!” he said. “We’ve got 
to find out things.” 

They went out info the silent 
street. An old-fashioned apartment 
house reared its plebeian head across 
the street. The shadows were 
lengthening; it was late. 

They pounded up the worn stone 
steps, Wentworth in the lead. He 
paused at the first convenient door, 
knocked peremptorily. Feet shuf- 
fled inside, but the door remained 
closed. 

“Open!” he shouted. 

SOME ONE within, moved by 
blind compulsion, came to the door, 
fumbled at the chain. The door 
opened slowly, revealing the rigid 
face of a young slattern of a woman, 
dressed in a dirty kimono. They 
pushed in. 

Margaret did the speaking. “Tell 
us what has happened to-day.” 

The woman spoke with an effort; 
her voice was trembling, and her 
reddened eyes showed traces of re- 
cent tears. 

“It’s been terrible,” she said 
slowly. “Jim — he’s my husband — 
he’s a policeman — has been acting 
queer for days. This morning he 
got up early, picked up a rifle he 
came home with yesterday, and 
starts to go out. This was his day 
off. He had the strangest, queerest 
look, and he didn’t even kiss me. I 
was scared. I talked to him; he 
didn’t answer; just looked at me 
AST— 9 



with a sort of blank face and walks 
out. 

“I run to the window, and the 
street is full of men, all with guns, 
all marching. Then some one comes 
tearing through the street in a po- 
lice car, shouting to every one to 
stay indoors all day; not to move 
out. Mr. Flynn, the neighbor next 
door — he’s a night watchman — said 
he saw all the police with guns 
pouring into Penn Station. It was 
a miracle, he said, how he managed 
to get home. D’you know anything, 
lady?” She was crying now. 

“No more than you do.” Margaret 
patted her heaving shoulders. 

“Nothing on the radio, either,” 
she sobbed. “I left it open all day. 
They always tell you what’s goin’ 
on in the world, but to-day ” 

The cabinet in the corner began to 
hum. The sound took on strength; 
the hum became a confused, blurred 
noise. 

Wentworth made the distance in 
two long strides, twirled the dials 
to tune more sharply. The blur 
cleared into a voice. It was Jordan, 
broadcasting to the country on all 
networks from Washington. 

“People of the United States,” he 
said. “This is Alfred Jordan the 
First addressing you. You are all 
to listen to me and obey in all things. 
This country had been suffering 
from misrule long enough. It has 
been going from bad to worse; your 
leaders have been inefficient and 
criminally foolish. You need dis- 
cipline, a strong hand over you, a 
man with vision and power. Then 
you will rise to your rightful place 
as a great nation, with food and 
plenty for every one, with the re- 
spect of the world beating on your 
shores. 

“I am your new dictator, and my 
lightest word shall be your law. The 



130 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



overthrow of the present stupid gov- 
ernment is complete. My army has 
met and defeated the governmental 
troops. The president and Congress 
have fled from my wrath. I am in 
full control; the seat of the govern- 
ment shall continue as before at 
Washington. You are to resume 
normal activities, always obedient to 
my will. You are to report at once 
the whereabouts of the fugitive 
president, of the officials of his de- 
posed government ” 

Wentworth shut the radio off an- 
grily. “It’s worse than I dared 
think. We’ll have to——” 

He broke off. The woman looked 
blank, obedient. But Dr. Knopf was 
set in a rigid mold. 

“Jordan is a great man,” he said 
monotonously. “I must obey him; I 
shall not ” 

Margaret cried out, shrinking 
away from him. 

Wentworth spoke rapidly : “Snap 
out of it, my friend. You take no 
orders from Jordan; you are free. 
Do you understand?” 

Dr. Knopf shook his head con- 
fusedly. His eyes cleared. “I was 
under his control then,” he said in 
awed tones. 

“So is the whole nation,” Went- 
worth groaned. “At least all who 
listened in. Jordan has brains, and 
knows how to use them. I should 
have thought of that broadcast 
stunt myself.” 

“Why not try it, Craig?” Mar- 
garet said timidly. 

“Couldn’t get the hook-up to be 
of any practical value,” he ex- 
plained. He started to the door. 
“We’re going to Washington.” 

“And Marshall?” 

He paused at the door, looked 
back. “I have an idea,” he said 
slowly, “that gentleman will be 
there, too.” 



AT THE MOMENT, however, 
Anthony Marshall had other fish to 
fry. The little instrument he had 
found interested him. Why had 
Craig Wentworth, whom Jordan had 
said was a physicist of parts, been 
working on it so feverishly at the 
time of his capture? Tony looked 
it over with shrewd eyes. He saw 
a flat, thin disk like a diaphragm. 
One side was slightly curved, as if 
it were a suction plate. Very fine 
filaments sprouted from the outer 
surface, dangling some three feet of 
wire. 

He took it to Columbia, com- 
manded the services of Verrill, head 
of the physics department. That 
obedient worthy examined it, un- 
screwed it delicately, peered into the 
complicated system of coils and bat- 
teries compactly within. 

“I can’t give you an opinion as to 
what it is without testing,” he said 
finally. “If you will leave it ” 

Tony left it and hurried back to 
the improvised prison. His prison- 
ers were gone, the Bluebands as 
mysteriously had disappeared. Fie 
leaned against the door, panting, 
cursing himself for a fool. Some- 
how Wentworth must have worked 
the gag out of his mouth. After 
that, it was simple. He did not 
know of course that Margaret Sim- 
mons was also possessed of the gift. 

Marshall realized with awful clar- 
ity that as long as the others knew 
of his secret, he was not safe. Jor- 
dan would not hesitate an instant 
to kill him off; as for Wentworth, 
the thought of the threatened opera- 
tion turned him physically sick. 
Now he was free, and both of them 
would be gunning for him. Alison 
La Rue, too ! One could never trust 
a woman, especially a woman of her 
type. He shuddered as though a cold 
blast had struck him. Almost he 
was ready to give up the fatal pos- 



HE FROM PROCYON 



131 



session, if only he could buy peace, 
safety. But no operation — no! 

He went wearily to his penthouse 
to think things out. It was night. 
His butler met him at the door. 

“A man’s been calling you all eve- 
ning, sir. Sounded very much ex- 
cited.” 

‘‘What was his name?” 

“Verrill, sir. Said it was most 
urgent you call him back.” 

Marshall’s feet ached; his heart 
pumped alarmingly from the unac- 
customed excitement and exertions 
of the past two days. His stomach 
was not so good, either. 

“T’hell with him,” he muttered 
drowsily. “I’m going to bed. Draw 
me a nice warm bath ; plenty o’ bath 
salts in it.” 

The next morning, around noon, 
he awoke. He felt a bit refreshed, 
and his courage had returned. He 
went to Columbia, found the physi- 
cist literally dancing with excite- 
ment. 

“This instrument ” he splut- 

tered. 

“Well, what about it?” Marshall 
was still decidedly grumpy. 

Verrill told him. He used easy, 
nontechnical language. Tony Mar- 
shall’s eyes went wider and wider. 
His bewildered mind groped for im- 
plications. If only he could use 
it 

Verrill’s voice acted like a cold 
douche. 

“Unfortunately,” he was saying, 
“the instrument is not complete. 
Just what activates it — in other 
words, what its motivating force is 
— I confess I don’t know.” 

Marshall knew. He saw it all 
now. He told the physicist in 
guarded words, not revealing too 
much. 

Verrill shook his head. “That’s 
out of my line, of course. And I 



doubt, with only that to go on, if 
any one could help.” 

“Who would be the most likely?” 

Verrill thought a moment. “Dr. 
Knopf, I’d say.” 

Faint memory stirred in Tony. 
“A little man with a stubby black 
beard and high, bald forehead?” 

“That’s the man. Do you know 
him?” 

But Marshall had already snatched 
up the tiny disk with its dangling 
wires, crowded it into his pocket, 
and was out of the laboratory. Fool, 
he clamored to himself, Knopf then 
was the other man with Wentworth, 
the insignificant chap to whom he 
had scarcely given a second thought. 
He had had everything within his 
grasp and had permitted it to slide 
out. 

Out in the street, once more nor- 
mal with life, he paused uncertainly. 
What could he do now? He would 
go to Washington, he determined. 
There was Jordan; there was the 
heart of things. 

He commandeered a taxi ; drove to 
the Newark airport. A fast cabin 
plane was placed at his disposal by 
suddenly obsequious officials. 

IX. 

BY THE 24TH, Jordan had mat- 
ters well in hand. His office in the 
White House was a maelstrom of 
excitement. Officials dashed in, 
clicked to attention, received 
snapped orders, saluted, and dashed 
out again. Telephones buzzed with 
unceasing clamor; telegraph instru- 
ments clicked under the flying fin- 
gers of skilled operators. The na- 
tion was completely enmeshed. 

“Bring in the prisoners, Hollis,” 
said Jordan the First, resplendent in 
gold lace. It was an admiral’s full- 
dress uniform with modifications. 

“Yes, sir.” 



132 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



They came in quietly, hands 
bound behind backs. The President 
of the United States, the secretary 
of state, the secretary of war, Gen- 
eral Collins, and the speaker of the 
house. 

Jordan leaned back in his padded 
armchair, and surveyed them with 
something of a sneer. They re- 
turned his look with dignity. 

“The former government of this 
country, eh?” 

They said nothing. 

“Well, you made a mess of it, and 
I, Jordan the First, have taken over. 
You were no good. Do you under- 
stand?” 

A tremor ran over them. “We 
understand,” they spoke in unison, 
mechanically. 

“That is fine!” said Jordan. “Now 
listen to me. From now on you take 
orders from me. I’m going to let 
you work; help in the divisions of 
government you used to handle. 
You’ll assist me; handle some of the 
detail work.” 

“Thank you, sir.” They sounded 
for all the world like a chorus of 
yes-men. “We’ll do our best.” 

“Take ’em out,” Jordan ordered. 
“And, oh, yes, remove their bonds. 
They aren’t necessary any more.” 

He was pleased. Government had 
proved far more complicated than he 
had dreamed. The capture of these 
men in their hiding place had proved 
a lucky break. They could do the 
necessary jobs for him, subject, of 
course, to his final say-so. He 
rubbed his hands with a touch of 
acquired pompousness. 

“A good job, eh, Hollis?” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“That broadcast idea of mine was 
smart. It calmed the country, 
stopped all rebellion. The people 
are my slaves now. They’ll follow 
me to hell. Now we’ll organize a 
bit and go after the rest of the 



world.” His eyes turned inward, as 
though seeing a vision. A beatific 
smile spread over his countenance. 

“Alfred Jordan the First, Dictator 
of the World!” 

How sweetly it rolled on the 
tongue ! 

Hollis was practical ; that was why 
he was an excellent secretary. 
“How about the others?” he ven- 
tured. 

Jordan came out of his dream. 
“Eh? What others?” 

Hollis tapped his forehead signifi- 
cantly. 

Jordan’s dark brow clouded. 

“Two of ’em are dead.” The 
wreck had been duly reported, and 
the incineration of car No. 2. No 
rescues had been made, according to 
the report. “As for Marshall and 
Wentworth — what can they do now? 
What’s the last word?” he ended 
with an eagerness that belied his as- 
sumed carelessness. 

“No news of Wentworth. Seems 
to have vanished out of sight. Mar- 
shall, according to Newark airport, 
took a plane, with their best pilot, 
and flew off, destination unknown.” 

“Scared,” remarked Jordan. “Run- 
ning for Canada, no doubt. I’ll get 
him there before long.” 

A guard walked in stiff-leggedly, 
said in will-less tones: “Miss Ali- 

son La Rue to see you, excellency.” 

Jordan was on his feet, gripping 
his desk, his face drained of blood. 
High heels made clatter through the 
doorway, and Alison, her round baby 
face wreathed in its best seductive 
smile, stood before his desk, alone. 
Doolittle was not with her. 

“Hello, big boy! I got here 
finally, didn’t I?” She turned on a 
gaping Hollis. “Scram, fellow! 
Can’t you see I want to talk to your 
boss?” 

Hollis went out. 

“Now you listen to me, Jordan,” 



HE FROM PROCYON 



133 



she shook a playful finger at the 
astounded dictator. 

Somehow, he listened. 

WENTWORTH, Dr. Knopf, and 
Margaret Simmons were in hiding 
on the outskirts of Washington. 
Sleepless days followed sleepless 
nights. It was a difficult, almost an 
impossible, job. Wentworth was 
trying to reconstruct his instrument. 
Pie tried one supply store after an- 
other, seeking the necessary parts. 
Some were still missing; vital ones. 
Margaret went out daily, doing the 
shopping. 

She walked slowly down the broad 
avenue. She was listless, weary. 
She had not slept for several days, 
but it was more than mere physical 
exhaustion. It was the maddening 
strain of close contact with the one 
man in all the world whom she 
loved, and whom alone she could not 
compel to love in return. 

He was wrapped up in the instru- 
ment, feverish over the enchainment 
of the country, heedless of her ex- 
cept as a comrade, a companion in 
the work. Once, when in Marshall’s 
power, there had been a gleam in his 
eyes, but it had quickly died. 

She turned down Pennsylvania 
Avenue. The street was filled with 
hurrying government clerks, obedi- 
ent to the strange, new government. 
How easy it would be to make one 
of them stop, become devoted to her. 
That tall young man with the blond 
hair, for instance. She toyed with 
the mad whim. He turned left, was 
entering a small, one-story building 
flush up against the imposing de- 
partment of agriculture. 

A man came around the corner 
from the opposite direction, stopped 
short, spoke to the tall young man. 
Margaret forgot her whim, born of 
tired, sapped strength, forgot her 
weariness. She shrank against the 



marble of the agriculture building, 
fearful of being noticed. 

The two men conversed earnestly 
a minute, then the door opened, and 
they disappeared within. Margaret 
stopped a taxi, got in, heart flutter- 
ing. She must get back to their 
quarters at once. 

The second man had been An- 
thony Marshall. 

WHEN MARGARET had fin- 
ished her story, Dr. Knopf said qui- 
etly : 

“Marshall has discovered your se- 
cret, Craig. That chap, from the 
description, is Hugh Lofting, the 
government’s chief neurologist. I 
know him well. He’s a good man. 
That building is his laboratory. 
Some one put Marshall on the right 
track, and Lofting will ferret out 
the last step within an hour.” 

Craig Wentworth rose, went to 
the desk drawer, took out a revolver. 
His face was set, grim. 

“What are you going to do?” Mar- 
garet asked in alarm. 

“Get that instrument back.” 

Dr. Knopf sighed and looked at 
his finger nails. “I’ll go with you.” 

It was over an hour before they 
got to Lof ting’s laboratory. Went- 
worth pushed the bell venomously. 

A white-coated young man opened 
the door. 

“Dr. Lofting? Sorry; he’s par- 
ticularly busy now. Left orders that 
he could see no one.” 

Wentworth pushed his way past. 
“You’re taking orders from me now. 
Keep quiet and tell me just what 
room he is in.” 

The young assistant became in- 
stantly docile. 

“Yes, sir. It’s the third door to 
the left. There’s some one in there 
with him. They’ve been together 
for over an hour.” 



134 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



“I know,” said Wentworth grimly. 
“Come on, Knopf.” 

Pistols in hand, they slid quietly 
down the corridor. The young man 
sat down in a chair in the entrance 
hall, immobile. At the third door 
they paused. It was closed, and a 
confused murmur of voices came 
from within. Wentworth put his 
ear to the door crack and listened. 
The voices grew stronger. Some 
one was saying : 

“It sounds of course unbelievable. 
But if Verrill said so, there must be 
something to it. The hook-up is 
rather simple. I could arrange it 
right here. It wouldn’t take over 
an hour all told.” 

Marshall’s voice filtered through, 
strained, anxious: “Means an op- 

eration, doesn’t it?” 

“Naturally. But a very minor one. 
No danger at all.” 

A gusty sigh, a mumbling. “Op- 
erations, operations! All right, I’ll 
be game.” 

Wentworth signaled to Dr. Knopf. 
He stepped back, put hand on knob, 
jerked quickly. The door crashed 
open and the two men plunged into 
the room, pistols steady. 

A tall young man with a pleasant 
smile froze into alarmed rigidity. 
Marshall swerved, recognized the 
intruders, and cowered in sudden 
fear. 

“Let me have that machine,” 
Wentworth demanded. 

Moving as in a daze Dr. Lofting 
extended his hand, dropped the pre- 
cious disk with its dangling wires 
into Wentworth’s outstretched fin- 
gers. For the moment Wentworth 
forgot Marshall. Dr. Knopf was 
covering him. 

Tony saw the opportunity, 
grasped it. Fear made him move 
swiftly. “Out of my way!” he cried 
suddenly. 

Dr. Knopf lowered his gun, side- 



stepped in complete will-lessness. 
Tony dashed out through the open 
door, ran down the long corridor, 
out into the safety of the street as 
fast as gouty legs and leaky heart 
could carry him. By the time Went- 
worth whirled for him, he was gone. 

“Damn!” He smiled wryly. “I 
keep forgetting. It’s not your 
fault, Knopf.” 

The doctor came out of it, cha- 
grined. Then he brightened: “At 
any rate we have the instrument.” 

“Yes. We’re going right back to 
the lab. As for you, Dr. Lofting,” 
he turned to that startled and emi- 
nent neurologist, “you will forget 
this entire transaction.” 

The tall man nodded mechanically. 

BACK IN their tiny room on the 
outskirts, with Margaret acting as 
nurse and Dr. Knopf swathed in 
aseptic white bandages, the opera- 
tion was performed. Wentworth lay 
still and cold on the improvised op- 
erating table. The odor of ether per- 
meated the room. Keen knives 
flashed and dipped. Tiny wires 
were inserted, imbedded in special 
agar packs around the pineal body. 

Knopf glared ferociously at the 
strange pulsing globule — his whole 
scientific being cried out to remove 
it, to analyze, to test — but the fate 
of Wentworth, of the world possi- 
bly, was in the way. And there was 
Margaret, white-lipped, holding her- 
self steady as a proper nurse should 
by wholesale drains on reserve en- 
ergy, praying with anguished inner 
tears for the safety of the man she 
loved. To Knopf it was just an- 
other operation. 

At last it was over, the sutures 
completed, and Wentworth stirred 
weakly. Knopf had left the room 
to wash and dress. In the whirl of 
dizziness incident upon ether it 
seemed to Wentworth that he saw 



HE FROM PROCYON 



135 



Margaret’s face close to his, brim- 
ming with tears, and a voice from 
far away, sobbing brokenly: 

“My dear, my dear, awake ! Don’t 
die ; I love you.” 

His brain stopped its ceaseless 
whirl; warmth flooded him; he 
opened his eyes. Margaret tried to 
step back, red flooding her shapely 
neck, but he caught weakly at her 
hand, and smiled contentedly. Then 
he went to sleep. 

Protruding from the base of his 
skull were two fine wires that ran 
down to the small of his back. There 
they entered a broad band which 
carried them around to his chest and 
into the flat disk that lay cupped 
against the flesh. 

DOOLITTLE did nothing else 
for two days but gape around Wash- 
ington. He forgot Maria, who may 
or may not have been weeping for 
her absent lord and master at home, 
he forgot his friends, he forgot even 
the sacrosanct bank, and reveled in 
an orgy of sight-seeing. All his life 
he had yearned to travel, he whose 
traveling had been confined to the 
diurnal subway trip from the Bronx 
to lower Manhattan. 

It was a novel sensation. He ate 
in the most gaudy restaurants and 
waved aside the check with an air, 
he journeyed conscientiously to the 
top of the Washington Monument, 
he blinked owlishly at the weird 
planes and bold primary colors of 
the modernists at the Phillips 
Memorial Gallery, he tiptoed in awe 
through the echoing Congressional 
Halls — Congress was on permanent 
vacation; Jordan had no need of it 
— he even saw how money was made 
at the treasury. And he lived on 
the fat of the land without a penny 
in his pockets. That much of his 
influence he had learned from his 
association with the ex-chorus girl. 



On the morning of the 25th he 
awoke in his luxurious suite at the 
Mayflower, and felt fed up with his 
wild, free life. The grim visage of 
Maria rose before him, softened and 
sentimentalized with the blurring 
effects of absence. Routine, habit, 
called him with irresistible force. 

He arose, dressed in the new 
clothes he had demanded and ob- 
tained from Washington’s highest- 
class establishment, and walked out 
to the respectful bows of the entire 
staff. He was going home. The old 
ruts looked good to one weary of 
traveling. It is a surprising com- 
mentary on the limitations of the 
human mind that the whole revolu- 
tion in the affairs of the nation, even 
the supreme power that Doolittle 
himself possessed, meant less to his 
awareness than the thought of 
Maria and his accustomed orbit in 
the nature of things. 

He taxied to the Union station 
and ordered drawing-room accom- 
modations on the Congressional 
Limited. A heavy, broad-shouldered 
man saw the transaction, saw the 
passage of tickets without con- 
comitant cash, and hurried into a 
booth to phone the dictator. He 
did not attempt an arrest himself. 

Doolittle hummed a senseless lit- 
tle tune, waiting for train time. His 
humming was interrupted by the 
march of a dozen bluebanded sol- 
diers, with Jordan at their head. 
The dictator’s dark eyes glowered 
with grim satisfaction. Alison had 
betrayed the meek little bank clerk. 

ALISON, clad in seductive negli- 
gee, cuddled against Jordan’s shoul- 
der. Her soft white hand rubbed his 
close-bristled cheek. She purred 
like a cat. 

“Sugar baby,” she said, “you’re 
swell! I loved you even when you 
hurt poor little Alison. Ain’t gonna 



136 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



do that any more, are you, big boy?” 

Jordan was enmeshed. In the old 
days his female contacts had been 
casual and never rose to the type 
displayed by Alison. Her seductive 
wiles stirred him; he was just so 
much putty in her hands. Within 
ten minutes from her first irruption 
into his office, he had been lost. 

“Sucker!” she thought to herself 
and redoubled her efforts. 

The man had the country in the 
hollow of his hands, and she had 
him. Beyond that she could not 
think. A dim thought of that silly 
old Bible story — what was it? — yeah 
— Samson and Delilah — floated 

through her mind and made it ache. 
Her thought processes were confined 
purely to feminine wiles and luxu- 
riant living and did not extend to 
political power. 

He kissed her hungrily. “I 
caught Doolittle this morning,” he 
said. 

“Yeah! I told you he was here. 
What are you going to do with 
him?” 

He said lazily: “Kill him.” 

She jumped up, startled. She was 
not exactly bad-hearted. “You won’t 
do that.” 

“Why not? I can’t take any more 
chances. Look how you got away.” 

She ignored that. “But you 
mustn’t. I — I kinda liked the little 
feller; he was so meek an’ innocent.” 

He shook his head decisively. He 
was once more Jordan the First. 

“I can’t allow personal sympathies 
to stand in the way. We must get 
rid of all of them; all, that is” — 
he looked at her avidly — “except 
you. We shall rule the world, you 
and I, and these people are a men- 
ace to our power and continued 
safety. Doolittle must go; and as 
fast as we catch the others, they go, 
too,” 

Alison sighed and relaxed into his 



arms again. She had done her best 
for the poor little bank clerk. After 
all, Alf was right, and a girl had to 
look out for herself these days. 

He stroked her hair. “That’s bet- 
ter,” he said. “Now suppose you 
get dressed for the review. It’s 
scheduled for three o’clock.” 

She yawned. “What’s the idea?” 
“A mass showing of strength,” he 
explained. “A hundred thousand 
troops will parade in battle forma- 
tion. I’ll address them, and broad- 
cast to the entire nation. It will 
clinch my regime and at the same 
time show the rest of the world that 
I’m not to be trifled with.” His 
eyes flashed darkly, he forgot the 
girl in the grandiose vision. 

“That’s the next step,” he said. 
“The conquest of the world. I’m 
building now a fleet of transatlantic 

planes. Once they’re finished ” 

Alison was bored. She yawned 
again, showing white teeth. “Love 
me, big boy,” she said. 

A man burst into the private 
chamber. His eyes were bloodshot, 
his dress in disorder, his fat stom- 
ach heaving under the stress of 
panting exhalations. 

Jordan shoved Alison aside, 
jumped to his feet. His right hand 
pawed at his pocket, came out 
clutching a flat automatic. 

“Marshall!” he breathed unbeliev- 
ingly. “This time you won’t escape, 

you double-crossing ” 

Alison La Rue flung herself across 
his arm, diverted his aim. The bul- 
let sped wild, crashed into ornate 
molding. 

“Don’t be a fool, Alf!” she 
screamed. “Wait; he has something 
to tell.” She had an aversion to 
blood spilled in her presence. And 
Tony had started her off on the road 
to success. 

Marshall swayed. His legs could 
hardly hold him. Fear haunted his 



HE FROM PROCYON 



137 



eyes. “Don’t shoot!” he pleaded. 
“I’ve got news. We’re lost, all of 
us; unless we get together.” 

Jordan flung the girl off his arm, 
held his gun ready for action. “I’ll 
give you a minute, Marshall. So 
talk fast. I’ve no use for double- 
crossers.” 

“It — it’s Wentworth,” Tony man- 
aged to gasp. 

Jordan stiffened to attention. 
Wentworth! The man he feared 
most, the man who had evaded him 
all along, yet who had done noth- 
ing so far! 

“What about Wentworth?” he 
flung out impatiently. 

“He’s here — in Washington. He 
has a machine ” 

The words poured from Marshall, 
the perspiration from his forehead. 
He was deathly afraid. He told the 
story of the raid, playing it up as 
an escape while they were en route 
to Jordan, of his discovery of the 
machine and the opinions of Ver- 
rill and Lofting. He told of Went- 
worth’s sudden reappearance, of the 
recapture of the machine, of his own 
escape. 

He did not tell how he wandered 
the streets of Washington all night, 
trying to figure out what he should 
do. Run away and forget it all, or 
play ball with either side. Went- 
worth he finally disposed of. The 
man was honest, and hence incor- 
ruptible. He would insist on his 
fool operation. Jordan was of his 
own ilk, a bit of a rogue, and hence 
might listen to reason this time. 

“So you see,” he concluded, “that 
we’ve got to work together, or we’re 
all cooked.” 

Cold panic clutched at Jordan’s 
heart. At the pinnacle of his power, 
at the moment of supreme success, 
at the opening of vast new vistas, 
to have this menace arise, this threat 
to everything he held. Rage swept 



through him, all the more furious 
for being so helpless. The others 
stared at him. He had the brains, 
they knew. Without him they were 
lost. 

Jordan calmed down and set his 
mind to work. He called New York 
and spoke to Verrill; he called Loft- 
ing and listened to him. There was 
no thought now of killing Marshall. 
When he was through, his brow 
smoothed out a bit. Alison and 
Tony pounced on this crumb of hope 
with avidity. 

“You’ve thought of something!” 
they cried in unison. 

“Yes,” he admitted, “I’ve thought 
of something. We’ll have to get 
busy at once.” 

He rang for Hollis. When that 
cat-footed secretary entered, he or- 
dered : 

“Bring Doolittle up here. You go 
along, Alison, to see he does no 
harm. Take the key.” 

X. 

THE REVIEW was a vast, glit- 
tering display. The great parade 
ground on the banks of the Potomac 
resounded with the tread of war- 
accoutered battalions, the thunder- 
ing plunge of interminable lines of 
tanks and heavy artillery. Each sol- 
dier, besides full marching pack, 
trench helmet, and bayoneted rifle, 
showed the distinctive blue band on 
the left arm. It was a tremendous 
sight, well calculated to throw fear 
and consternation into the hearts of 
alien nations. Unfortunately there 
were none represented. 

The first overthrow had caused 
the cables to the home governments 
to hum with caustic reports from the 
diplomats stationed in Washington, 
but then, as they came under Jor- 
dan’s personal influence, the reports 
changed to uncritical adulation. 



138 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



Alarmed, the governments hastily 
severed relations, left the befuddled 
representatives to look out for them- 
selves, and prepared for war behind 
a vigorous blockade. Even the 

short-wave receiving sets had been 
dismantled; one small experience of 
a broadcast reception from the 
United States had been enough. 
Now, for the first time in history, 
all inter-European feuds were for- 
gotten. The common enemy was 
Jordan. 

The endless battalions marched 
past the reviewing stand, saluted 
with a thunder of cheers, and drew 
up at the farther end of the field in 
dress formation. On the reviev/ing 
stand a steel cupola had been 
erected. Within its comfortable di- 
mensions rested the reviewing party. 
They were Jordan, Alison La Rue, 
Hollis, Marshall, and Doolittle. 

They stared out at the parade 
through bullet-proofed glass. A 
cluster of microphones was grouped 
in one corner. From the dome of 
the cupola protruded the little 
sound-magnifying cones. Jordan 
was playing safe against all eventu- 
alities. The atmosphere was tense. 

Alison said scornfully: “The 

show is almost over, and they ain’t 
showed up. I don’t think anything 
is going to happen.” 

Marshall mopped his baldish 
brow. “You don’t know Wentworth. 
I’m scared.” He turned suddenly 
on Doolittle. “Every one remember 
what he’s to do,” said Jordan grimly. 
“Did you hear me?” 

The little man started and blinked 
nervously. “Y-yes, sir.” 

It was ail very confusing, quite 
frightening, in fact. His reprieve 
from instant death, he had been told, 
depended on implicit obedience. Yet 
he was not quite certain in his mind 
what it was all about. 

The parade was over; the great 



show was finished. The troops lined 
up to hearken to the words of their 
leader. The whole country was 
listening in, clinging to their radios, 
drawn like moths to their certain 
flaming destruction. 

Jordan took a deep breath. For 
the first time that grim afternoon 
he smiled. 

“Well,” he remarked, “Wentworth 
did not show up. Either the ma- 
chine didn’t work, or he got cold 
feet.” 

He switched on the microphones. 
“Brave Bluebands, men and women 
of America,” he orated. Then it 
happened. 

WENTWORTH, Margaret, and 
Dr. Knopf were hidden in a little 
house about a mile up the Potomac. 
From there they could command a 
clear view of the parade ground. 
There, too, the atmosphere was 
tense. 

“I hope it works,” Margaret said 
anxiously. Her hands were clenched 
white with the strain of waiting. 

“I’m sure of it,” Wentworth re- 
turned positively. His face was 
drawn, but his eyes blazed with 
prospective consummation. “We 
figured it at about four times ampli- 
fication, didn’t we, Knopf?” 

“About that.” 

“That’s plenty. We’ll not only 
blank out Jordan’s influence, but 
override it four times. I’ll make 
that army turn on him and bring 
him to us a prisoner.” 

“I’m afraid,” the girl whispered. 

“Of what?” 

“I don’t know. Of something go- 
ing wrong. Suppose Marshall 
teamed up with him.” 

Wentworth smiled. “We’d still 
have the edge; two to one.” He 
swept the far-off scene with power- 
ful glasses. “Hello, they’re start- 
ing!” 



HE FROM PROCYON 



139 



The tiny doll-like battalions swept 
across the field and lined up, wait- 
ing. 

“Why don’t we begin?” Dr. 
Knopf asked impatiently. 

“I’m waiting for the commence- 
ment of Jordan’s speech. It will be 
more dramatic to cut him off; to 
make him against his will confess 
his own sins.” 

Just then the air was filled with 
voluminous clarity of sound. Even 
here, a mile away, the sono-magni- 
fiers carried the speaking voice. 

“Brave Bluebands, men and 
women of America ” 

Wentworth flipped a tiny switch. 
Then he concentrated, fiercely, in- 
tently, with hll the will power at his 
command. Over and over he willed : 

“Stop, Jordan, stop! I am more 
powerful than you. Obey my will.” 

The little disk on his chest vi- 
brated with the driving impact. It 
caught the radiations of the un- 
spoken thoughts, stepped them up 
to four times normal power, and sent 
them out in vibratory waves to im- 
pinge directly on the wills of all 
within a radius of twenty-five miles. 

“Stop, Jordan, stop! I am more 
powerful than you. Obey my will.” 

The heavens, that had been filled 
with the thunderous sound of Jor- 
dan, stilled suddenly. The deathly 
silence had something physical 
about it. Jordan had ceased, broken 
off his speech by a will now supe- 
rior to his own. 

Margaret gave a glad little cry; 
Dr. Knopf’s ascetic face wreathed 
into a weary smile. 

“We’ve won; we’ve won,” the girl 
cried. . 

WITHIN the steel cupola was 
consternation. Jordan, in full 
stride, felt an awful plucking at his 
mind. “Stop, stop!” cried an irre- 
sistible inner force. He broke off 



in the middle of a word. Huge 
globules of perspiration burst on 
his forehead. He turned helplessly 
to the others, mute appeal in his 
eyes. He could not speak. 

Outside a cold wind sucked 
through the glittering ranks. Some- 
thing seemed to lift from each man’s 
mind, something that had been a 
deadly incubus, a vampire that left 
only bloodless thoughts behind. 
Blueband stirred and looked uneas- 
ily at Blueban'd. An air of bewil- 
derment engulfed them. What were 
they doing here, in martial array? 
It would take only a little word, an 
added impetus to the will, to start 
incalculable things in that great, 
suddenly released throng. 

Alison and Doolittle were stricken 
dumb. They were not much good in 
an emergency. 

It was Tony Marshall who rose to 
the occasion. “It’s Wentworth!” he 
cried feverishly. “Yell, damn you, 
every one of you. Yell: ‘Talk, Jor- 
dan, talk!’ ” 

The others awoke from their daze, 
threw themselves into the task. 
Three brains poured out their influ- 
ence in concerted waves, adding 
their strength to his helplessness. 
Currents eddied and lashed at each 
other in mortal combat in Jordan’s 
mind. His face was drawn and 
white from the terrific inner con- 
flict. Again they yelled, willing 
themselves on. 

The loud speakers crashed and 
boomed with the communal sound, 
flooded the little house up the Poto- 
mac with the ominous noise. It 
beat upon the three, beat with over- 
riding force. Dr. Knopf succumbed 
at once to the influence. Margaret, 
after one anguished look, stared 
blankly, her own will crushed to 
earth. 

Jordan’s voice, suddenly trium-, 
phant, beat and clamored through 



140 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



the air. “We are victorious!” he 
chanted. “Wentworth, wherever 
you are, obey my will.” 

“Obey his will!” shouted the oth- 
ers, sweat pouring from every vein 
with the fury of their concentration. 

The great army ceased their un- 
easy stirrings ; minds went rigid, 
blank once more. Again they were 
automatons, harps to be played on 
by skillful fingers. 

Wentworth reeled under the re- 
peated blows on his consciousness. 
Invisible little hammers plunged 
with sickening thuds within his 
mind, beating out, hammering the 
iterated refrain: “Obey, obey!” 

He felt himself slipping, going, a 
will-less mechanism. Despairing he 
turned for aid. There was none. 
Knopf of course was helpless. Mar- 
garet, too. She was staring straight 
in front, unconscious of Wentworth, 
of her surroundings. That part of 
Wentworth which was still free 
cursed himself for a fool. Why had 
he not foreseen? Why had he not 
made duplicate machines, given 
Margaret one? Jordan had out- 
smarted him. Somehow he had 
united all the others — four of them 
together — and they were fighting 
him, Craig Wentworth. His, Craig’s 
amplification, was a little less than 
four. He had miscalculated. That 
was why he was being defeated. 

The little spark of freedom blazed 
brightly just an instant. Wentworth 
willed fiercely, with every atom of 
concentration he could muster 
against the implacable, heaven-fill- 
ing sound: 

“All of you, obey me, stop!” 

It was a desperate, nerve-smash- 
ing effort. 

Within the cupola four wills felt 
the inflowing tide. It engulfed, 
ripped their wills apart momenta- 
rily. Their voices faltered, were si- 



lent. Once again there was silence. 
Again the hundred thousand on pa- 
rade, like puppets pulled this way 
and that by strings, moved uneasily. 

But that last final surge of will 
had left Wentworth reeling, ex- 
hausted. He could not keep it up. 
He was drunk, drunk with fatigue. 
He lashed his mind to renewed ef- 
forts, he flogged his will unmerci- 
fully. It was no use. Toxic poi- 
sons clogged the cells of his brain; 
they refused their overloaded tasks, 
broke down. He wanted to lie down, 
to sleep. He staggered and swayed, 
and still he was victorious. No 
sound came through the waiting air. 

It was the end, however. Jordan’s 
iron will kept the four of them furi- 
ously shouting, even though no 
words came. Then Wentworth was 
through. He could not go on. The 
occupants of the cupola felt the sud- 
den release, their voices rose tri- 
umphant. 

“Wentworth, Wentworth, obey!” 
Wentworth mumbled: “I obey!” 

Vast weariness, cosmic indiffer- 
ence, engulfed him. Sleep, sleep, the 
blessedness of submission! 

The two simple words flashed 
through their minds. Jordan’s face 
was a fury of exultation. He had 
won! 

“Where are you, Wentworth?” 

It was all over. Wentworth an- 
swered in halting, blurred words: 
“In a house up the river. On the 
bank. About a mile.” 

“Good!” said Jordan. “Await my 
orders.” He turned his words to the 
rigid troops, once more safe within 
his power. 

“Colonel Harman,” he snapped. 
“Proceed at once with your battalion 
up the river. Capture all occupants 
of house a mile up on the shore. 
Bring them back.” 

A long file of troops detached 
themselves, wheeled to barked com- 



HE FROM PROCYON 



141 



mands, and marched with quick, 
simultaneous tread. 

“We’ve got him now,” Jordan 
chuckled and rubbed his hands. 
“There’s nothing to stop me now.” 

“How about us?” Marshall inter- 
jected. 

“Oh, sure, all of us together, of 
course,” Jordan answered hastily. 
But his eyes narrowed. He was 
thinking hard. 

WENTWORTH was watching 
the approach of the column of in- 
fantry with pain-blasted eyes. He 
was through, washed up. Jordan 
had beaten him. Now the whole 
world lay at his feet. He, Went- 
worth, had failed. His head ached 
terribly. The awful beating word 
smashed down with damning, steady 
force upon him: 

“Obey! Obey!” 

Jordan was taking no chances, was 
holding him to his will by continued 
reiteration. 

The marching troops were closer 
now. The low, frosty sun sent 
steam up in thin vanishing wreaths 
from their lips; bayonets gleamed 
businesslike, with strangely red- 
dened tips. Already he could see 
the distinctive arm hands. 

His lackluster eyes glanced fee- 
bly around the bare room. Within 
a minute the head of the column 
would be upon him, would seize and 
gag him. The back of his mind, that 
tiny spark which was still free, still 
under the influence of his instru- 
ment, thought: 

“Jordan will kill me, of course. I 
am the last obstacle in his path. But 
I don’t care. Anything, anything is 
better than this torture.” 

What were those lines of Shelley? 

Yet now despair itself is mild, 

Even as the winds and waters are; 

I could lie down like a tired child, 

And weep away the life of care 



Which I have borne and yet must 
bear, 

Till death like sleep might steal on 
me 

His wan eyes traveled slowly. 
They lighted on the rigid blank face 
of Dr. Knopf. 

“Poor fellow,” he thought. “I got 
him into this.” 

They traveled on. They brushed 
over Margaret, came to a halt. She 
was seated on a crude kitchen chair, 
her hands folded in her lap. Her 
face was drawn and pinched; she 
was suffering. Something fluttered 
within her eyes; some little ghost 
that tried to escape the vast compul- 
sion. 

A flood of warm pity surged 
through Wentworth. Poor girl, 
what would happen to her? She 
would — she would — of course — she 
would be killed, even as he, Craig 
Wentworth. Jordan was ruthless. 

Something snapped within him. 
He knew now what he felt, what had 
lain latent throughout the surge of 
events, the feverish rush of the past 
several days. He loved Margaret 
Simmons! Fool, fool that he had 
been! She would die now, so would 
he. It was too late! 

He stared out of the window at 
the inevitable approach. The thud 
of feet against earth came up even 
in the face of the damnable “Obey!” 
In half a minute it would be over. 

A wave of rebellion swept over 
him. Frantically he thrust his will 
against the palsying sound. He 
shouted, he screamed, he clamored 
with all the force of his fagged-out 
brain against the engulfing influ- 
ence. It was useless. The troops 
were outside already, a white-haired 
colonel barked a command. 

“Obey!” shouted the air waves 
with insane glee. 

Heavy-shod feet stamped into the 
room. Some one seized his arm. He 



142 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



stared with onrushing insanity, 
thrust all the fervor of his will into 
one last smashing attack, and col- 
lapsed. 

JORDAN put down his glasses 
with a grin. “They’ve got him 
now,” he said. “But you keep it up. 
Don’t relax a minute until we have 
him here. He’s slippery, that fel- 
low.” 

“Obey! Obey!” they all said to- 
gether, monotonously. 

It was exhausting. Marshall was 
near collapse; Alison was shrill 
from much shouting. Doolittle re- 
peated the words mechanically. He 
had been threatened with death if he 
did not persist. 

“What is Maria doing now?” he 
wondered with his subconscious 
mind. The phantom of her grim, 
red visage rose before him. Even 
the mole with its three wagging 
black hairs on her chin. She spelled 
the old tight little circle of routine, 
of habits in accustomed grooves. 
There was safety, peace. What was 
he, Charles Doolittle, doing in these 
strange surroundings, harried, bul- 
lied, threatened? 

A wave of meek rebellion swept 
over him. He looked around hur- 
riedly. No one was watching him; 
each was concentrating, forcing his 
voice. He stopped the stupid chant 
and surrendered himself to a wal- 
lowing yearning for home and 
Maria. 

At that very moment Craig Went- 
worth had shrieked his last attempt 
at defiance. The sono-amplifiers 
ceased suddenly. The fourfold will 
of the far-off man had beaten down 
the united efforts of the three. 

Pressure lifted from Wentworth 
like a gasping diver hauled hastily 
to the surface from deep waters. 
The soldier who had gripped his 



arm, released him, stepped back un- 
certainly. The colonel brushed his 
forehead in bewilderment ; there was 
confusion among the crowding men. 

There was more confusion in the 
steel-built cupola. 

Jordan staggered back, as if from 
a physical blow. He swerved, saw 
Doolittle — silent, rapt in ecstasy. In 
one stride he was at the little man’s 
side, towering. 

“Shout, damn you, shout!” 

His dark face was distorted with 
rage, his brain was reeling, his arm 
uplifted to strike. 

Doolittle cowered, brought rudely 
back from his dreams. Something 
gushed. The meek, down-trodden 
little man was like a cornered rabbit 
with a terrier cutting off escape. 
Futilely, blindly, he fought back. 

“I won’t, I won’t!” he screamed. 
“You can’t make me. I’ve had 
enough. Go on, kill me, I don’t 
care.” 

Wentworth’s fuddled senses then 
cleared magically. It was now in 
effect five — his fourfold will plus 
the opposition of Doolittle — against 
three. He concentrated, forced his 
commands into roaring channels. 

Margaret got up from her chair, 
a look of wide surprise on her face. 
Iron constricting bands around her 
brain lifted. She saw what was hap- 
pening, spoke to the soldiers. 

“March back to the parade ground. 
Seize Jordan. It is I who command 
you.” Her voice could not carry to 
the reviewing stand, but the troops 
were within sound. 

With rigid mechanical movements 
the men moved out, formed ranks 
and went back. 

Jordan’s arm fell to his side. His 
will was like water; he sat down 
with folded hands, waiting for 
Wentworth’s further orders. Ali- 
son, her face blown with red 



HE FROM PROCYON 



143 



splotches, moaned and slipped to the 
ground. Marshall fainted. His 
heart was pumping too hard. His 
breathing came stertorously. 

Only Doolittle stood erect, trium- 
phant. His will flowed soothingly 
along on the tide of Wentworth’s 
radiated influence. Fear had left 
him. 

XI. 

IT WAS QUITE dark when 
Craig Wentworth stepped to the 
microphones and sent his broadcast 
message of deliverance to the nation. 

“You are all free now,” he said, 
and men, women, and children 
everywhere took deep breaths, 
looked at each other dazedly, and 
for the first time realized what 
strange compulsion they had been 
under. “Jordan is a prisoner, and 
so are all who were responsible for 
your hypnotic condition. Neither 
you nor the world at large will ever 
fully appreciate the terrible disaster 
that hung over you, the incalculable 
consequences that might have en- 
sued from Jordan’s insane will. It 
is better so. Even now I am send- 
ing cables to the other nations of 
the Earth, apprising them of the 
overthrow of the menace to their 
security. No longer need they arm 
against a foe who would have de- 
stroyed them. 

“As for you, so-called Bluebands, 
poor hypnotized instruments of a 
fanatic will, I release you. Disperse 
quietly to your homes, attend to 
your old normal duties. Special 
trains are waiting for your accom- 
modation. 

“To the nation of listeners, sleep 
with assurance to-night. By twelve 
midnight neither Jordan nor the 
others shall be of any further con- 
cern to you.” 



IT WAS near midnight. The 
blue-white light beat fiercely from 
the overhead reflector like a spot- 
light on the immaculate porcelain 
of the table. A figure lay on it, 
swathed in white robes, a gag of 
soft-white gauze in its mouth. Its 
head was shaven. Black eyes stared 
upward, indomitable with driving 
hate, unwinking, trying desperately 
to force its will across. 

Around the operating table were 
a group of figures. Dr. Knopf, 
dressed in surgeon’s white, his face 
masked, his hairy arms bare to the 
elbow. With him was another fig- 
ure, similarly attired, Dr. Hugh 
Lofting. Assistants hovered solici- 
tously, arranging terribly gleaming 
instruments. 

From outside, through the venti- 
lator, came the buzz of the city of 
Washington, awake from its night- 
mare, humming with excitement. 
Wentworth and Margaret watched 
with half-sorrowful eyes, turning to 
each other for comfort. Something 
passed between them, warm, under- 
standing. His hand tightened on 
her arm. She sighed contentedly. 

“Poor fellow, in a way I’m sorry 
for him. All his dreams smashed.” 
“Better his, than that the world 
should go smash. Afraid, darling?” 
She smiled at him bravely. “No. 
I’ll welcome the operation. I have 
what I wanted anyway.” 

He squeezed her arm. “We’ll be 
the last to go on. Then we shall be 
sure it’s all over.” 

They turned Jordan over, so the 
back of his head was exposed. A 
delicate galvanometer registered the 
driving radiations from the other- 
universe globules. The needle was 
pressing hard against the limiting 
knob. 

“Too bad,” Knopf said regretfully 
to Lofting, “that Wentworth won’t 
let us remove the globules intact and 



144 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



analyze them. Think what it would 
mean.” 

“I know.” Lofting nodded. “I’d 
give my right arm to find out how 
they work.” 

“Orders are orders.” Knopf 
sighed and swabbed the base of the 
skull with iodine. 

These men were pure scientists. 

He lifted his scalpel for the first 
swift incision. A distant church 
chimed out the hour of twelve. The 
point of the scalpel pricked the taut 
skin. 

“Dr. Knopf! Dr. Knopf!” 

The voice of a white-jacketed as- 
sistant pierced the tense silence like 
a sword. Fortunately, the surgeon’s 
nerves were steel. He lifted the 
scalpel. 

“Look at the galvanometer!” 

All eyes turned. Outside, the last 
echo of the bells died on the air. 

The needle, which a moment be- 
fore was quivering against maximum 
charge, now rested quietly against 
the zero knob. It registered noth- 
ing. 

Wentworth was at the machine in 
swift steps. “A wire must have 
loosened.” 

But all his searchings disclosed 
nothing. All the connections were 
tight. 

“What does it mean?” For the 
first time Knopf was agitated. 

Wentworth’s face twisted with 
strange emotion. “Only one thing,” 
he said quietly. “The gift has been 
taken away from us.” 

“Nonsense!” 

“I’ll prove it.” He stared stead- 
ily at Dr. Knopf. “I want you to 
put that scalpel down on the operat- 
ing table. Obey me, it is my will.” 

The neurologist looked at the 
scalpel in his hand, removed his 
mask, and looked at Wentworth. 

“Was that a test?” he demanded. 

“Yes.” 



“Then you are right. The power 
has disappeared, evaporated. I feel 
under no compulsion to do what you 
desired.” 

The long operating room was a 
babel of sound. Every one spoke at 
once and no one heard the other. 
Wentworth slipped out, brought the 
three bound captives into the room. 
Their frightened eyes searched his. 
One by one he released them, tested 
their wills on the galvanometer. It 
did not react. The terrible gift — 
the curse as it had turned out — had 
gone completely. Once more they 
were all normal everyday human be- 
ings. 

The clamor grew. What did it 
mean? What had happened? 

WENTWORTH saw him then. 
A slight shimmering at first, a mere 
brighter concentration of light. 
Then, as it flowed into the area of 
the operating lamp’s blue-white 
glow, rich in ultra-violet radiations, 
the figure took form and shape. 

“There he is!” Wentworth cried, 
with extended arm. “The being who 
appeared to me that first night.” 

He from Procyon smiled a super- 
human smile. The comedy was 
over; the month of Earth time had 
expired. The globules next the 
pineal gland were already absorbed 
in the surrounding tissues. His 
great transparent body dazzled the 
onlookers. An interne — more devout 
than the rest — fell to his knees. He 
from Procyon looked like a tradi- 
tional archangel. 

It had been a fairly interesting 
experiment. The scurryings of 
these insignificant creatures had 
provided a momentary amusement. 
Low grade, irrational, far down in 
the evolutionary scale. It was time 
he went back to Procyon, to the 
society of his fellows. He moved 
AST-9 



HE FROM PROCYON 



145 



out of the beating illumination. His 
shining form faded, flowed into the 
nothingness from which it had 
seemed to come. He was gone! 

Earth-born creatures stared with 
wide, incredulous eyes where the ap- 



parition had been. The sense of 
other-universe, of tremendous pow- 
ers beyond their knowledge, weighed 
on Earthen brains. Margaret shud- 
dered, and pressed close for comfort 
to Craig Wentworth. 




AST— 1 O 




M ostly in this book i shall 

specialize upon indications 
that there exists a trans- 
portary force that I shall call Tele- 
portation. I shall be accused of 
having assembled lies, yarns, hoaxes, 
and superstitions. To some degree 
I think so, myself. To some degree 
I do not. I offer the data. 

A NAKED MAN in a city street 
— the track of a horse in volcanic 
mud — the mystery of reindeer’s ears 
— a huge, black form, like a whale, 
in the sky, and it £rips red drops 
as if attacked by celestial sword- 
fishes — an appalling cherub appears 
in the sea — 

Confusions. 

Showers of frogs and blizzards of 
snails, gushes of periwinkles down 
from the sky — 

The preposterous, the grotesque, 
the incredible — and why, if I am 



going to tell of hundreds of these is 
the quite ordinary so regarded? 

An unclothed man shocks a crowd 
— a moment later, if nobody is gen- 
erous with an overcoat, somebody is 
collecting handkerchiefs to knot 
around him. 

A naked fact startles a meeting of 
a scientific society — and whatever it 
has for loins is soon diapered with 
conventional explanations. 

Chaos and muck and filth — the in- 
determinable and the unrecordable 
and the unknowable — and all men 
are liars — and yet — 

Wigwams on an island — sparks in 
their columns of smoke. 

Centuries later — the uncertain 
columns are towers. What once were 
fluttering sparks are the motionless 
lights of windows. According to 
critics of Tammany Hall, there has 
been monstrous corruption upon 
this island : nevertheless, in the 
midst of this, this regularization has 




LOI 



147 



Here is the most astounding collation of factual 
data ever offered to a large audience. This hook has 
been read by three thousand people — mostly writers 
seeking plots! We offer it to the one group in 
America which can digest it. 

Charles Fort, the author, was the stormy petrel 
of twentieth century science. He spent his whole 
life in quest of phenomena. And he found facts so 
strange, so incredible, that when he flung them in the 
face of present-day science and cried: ‘ ‘ Answer me! ’ * 

— the scientists could not. 

LOI is the natural inheritance for a thoughtful 
audience. So we bring it to you. It opens the door 
to controversial discussions in “ Brass Tacks.” Read 



it all. And you will believe 



occurred. A woodland sprawl has 
sprung to stony attention. 

The Princess Caraboo tells, of 
herself, a story, in an unknown lan- 
guage, and persons who were them- 
selves liars, have said that she lied, 
though nobody has ever known what 
she told. The story of Dorothy Ar- 
nold has been told thousands of 
times, but the story of Dorothy Ar- 
nold and the swan has not been told 
before. A city turns to a crater, and 
casts out eruptions, as lurid as fire, 
of living things — and where Cag- 
liostro came from, and where he 
went, are so mysterious that only 
historians say they know — venomous 
snakes crawl on the sidewalks of 
London — and a star twinkles — 

But the underlying oneness in all 
confusions. 

An onion and a lump of ice — and 
what have they in common? 

Traceries of ice, millions of years 
ago, forming on the surface of a 
pond — later, with different ma- 
terials, these same forms will ex- 
press botanically. If something had 
examined primordial frost, it could 



that super-science is real. 

— The Editor. 



have predicted jungles. Times when 
there was not a living thing on the 
face of this earth — and, upon pyro- 
lusite, there were etchings of forms 
that, after the appearance of cellu- 
lose, would be trees. Dendritic 
sketches, in silver and copper, pre- 
figured ferns and vines. 

Mineral specimens now in mu- 
seums — calcites that are piles of 
petals — or that long ago were the 
rough notes of a rose. Scales, horns, 
quills, thorns, teeth, arrows, spears, 
bayonets — long before they were the 
implements and weapons of living 
things they were mineral forms. I 
know of an ancient sketch that is to- 
day a specimen in a museum — a 
colorful, little massacre that was 
composed of calcites ages before re- 
ligion was dramatized — pink forms 
impaled upon mauve spears, sprin- 
kled with drops of magenta. I know 
of a composition of barytes that ap- 
peared ages before the Israelites 
made what is said to be history — 
blue waves heaped high oil each side 
of a drab streak of forms like the 
horns of cattle, heads of asses. 



148 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



humps of camels, turbans, and up- 
held hands. 

Underlying oneness — 

A new star appears — and just how 
remote is it from drops of water, 
of unknown origin, falling on a cot- 
tonwood tree, in Oklahoma? Just 
what have the tree and the star to 
do with the girl of Swanton Novers, 
upon whom gushed streams of oils? 
And why was a clergyman equally 
greasy? Earthquakes and droughts 
and the sky turns black with spiders, 
and, near Trenton, New Jersey, 
something pegged stones at farmers. 
If lights that have been seen in the 
sky were upon the vessels of explor- 
ers from other worlds — then living 
in New York City, perhaps, or in 
Washington, D. C., perhaps, there 
are inhabitants of Mars, who are se- 
cretly sending reports upon the 
ways of this world, to their govern- 
ments? 

A theory feels its way through 
surrounding ignorance — the tendrils 
of a vine feel their way along a trel- 
lis — a wagon train feels its way 
across a prairie — 

Underlying oneness — 

TERRIFIED HORSES, up on 
their hind legs, hoofing a storm of 
frogs. 

Frenzied springboks, capering 
their exasperations against frogs 
that were tickling them. 

Storekeepers, in London, gaping 
at frogs that were tapping on their 
window panes. 

We shall pick up an existence by 
its frogs. 

Wise men have tried other ways. 
They have tried to understand our 
state of being, by grasping at its 
stars, or its arts, or its economics. 
But, if there is an underlying one- 
ness of all things, it does not mat- 
ter where we begin, whether with 
stars, or laws of supply and demand, 



or frogs, or Napoleon Bonaparte. 
One measures a circle, beginning 
anywhere. 

I have collected 294 records of 
showers of living things. 

I got the story of the terrified 
horses in the storm of frogs from 
Mr. George C. Stoker, of Lovelock, 
Nevada. Mr. John Reid, of Love- 
lock who is known to me as a writer 
upon geological subjects, vouches 
for Mr. Stoker, and I vouch for Mr. 
Reid. Mr. Stoker vouches for me. 
I have never heard of anything — 
any pronouncement, dogma, enuncia- 
tion, or pontification — that was bet- 
ter substantiated. 

What is a straight line? A 
straight line is the shortest distance 
between two points. Well, then, 
what is the shortest distance be- 
tween two points? That is a 
straight line. According to the test 
of ages, the definition that a straight 
line is a straight line cannot be im- 
proved upon. I start with a logic 
as exacting as Euclid’s. 

Mr. Stoker was driving along the 
Newark Valley, one of the most ex- 
tensive of the desert regions of 
Nevada. Thunderstorm. Down 
came frogs. Up on their hind legs 
went the horses. 

The exasperated springboks. 
They were told of, in the Northern 
News (Vryburg, Transvaal) March 
21, 1925, by Mr. C. J. Grewar, of 
Uitenhage. Also I have a letter 
from Mr. Grewar. 

The Flats — about 50 miles from 
Uitenhage — springboks leaping and 
shaking themselves unaccountably. 
At a distance, Mr. Grewar could 
conceive of no explanation of such 
eccentricities. He investigated, and 
saw that a rain of little frogs and 
fishes had pelted the springboks. 
Mr. Grewar heard that some time 
before, at the same place, there had 
been a similar shower. 



LO! 



149 



Coffins have come down, from the 
sky: also, as everybody knows, silk 
hats and horse collars and pajamas. 
But these things have come down 
at the time of a whirlwind. The two 
statements that I start with are that 
no shov/er exclusively of coffins, nor 
of marriage certificates, nor of alarm 
clocks had been recorded; but that 
showers exclusively of living things 
are common. And yet the explana- 
tion by orthodox scientists who ac- 
cept that showers of living things 
have occurred is that the creatures 
were the products of whirlwinds. 
The explanation is that little frogs, 
for instance, fall from the sky, un- 
mixed with anything else, because, 
in a whirlwind, the creatures were 
segregated, by differences in specific 
gravity. But when a whirlwind 
strikes a town, away go detachables 
in a monstrous mixture, and there’s 
no findable record of washtubs com- 
ing down in one place, all the town’s 
cats in one falling battle that lumps 
its infelicities in one place, and all 
the kittens coming down together 
somewhere else, in a distant bunch 
that meows for its lump of mothers. 

SEE LONDON newspapers, Aug- 
ust 18th and 19th, 1921 — innumer- 
able little frogs that appeared, dur- 
ing a thunderstorm, upon the 17th, 
in streets of the northern part of 
London. 

I have searched in almost all Lon- 
don newspapers, and in many pro- 
vincial newspapers, and in scientific 
publications. There is, findable by 
me, no mention of a whirlwind upon 
the 17th of August, and no mention 
of a fall from the sky of anything 
else that might be considered an- 
other segregated discharge from a 
whirlwind, if there had been a 
whirlwind. 

A whirlwind runs amok, and is 
filled with confusions: and yet to 



the incoherences of such a thing 
have been attributed the neatest of 
classifications. I do not say that no 
wind ever scientifically classifies ob- 
jects. I have seen orderly, or log- 
ical, segregations by wind-action. I 
ask for records of whirlwinds that 
do this. There is no perceptible 
science by a whirlwind, in the de- 
livery of its images. It rants trees, 
doors, frogs, and parts of cows. J3ut 
living things have fallen from the 
sky, or in seme unknown way have 
appeared, and have arrived homo- 
geneously. If they have not been 
segregated by winds, something has 
selected them. 

There have been repetitions of 
these arrivals. The phenomenon of 
repetition, too, is irreconcilable with 
the known ways of whirlwinds. 
There is an account, in the London 
Daily News, Sept. 5, 1922, of little 
toads, which for two days had been 
dropping from the sky, at Chalons- 
sur-Saone, France. 

There are accounts of showering 
things that came from so far away 
that they were unknown in places 
where they arrived. 

If only horses and springboks ex- 
press emotions in these matters, 
we’ll be calm thinking that even liv- 
ing things may have been trans- 
ported to this earth from other 
worlds. 

Philadelphia Public Ledger, Aug. 
8, 1891 — a great shower of fishes, at 
Seymour, Indiana. They were un- 
known fishes. Public Ledger, Feb. 
6, 1890 — a shower of fishes, in Mont- 
gomery County, California. “The 
fishes belong to a species altogether 
unknown here.” New York Sun, 
May 29, 1892 — a shower, at Coal- 
burg, Alabama, of an enormous num- 
ber of eels that were unknown in 
Alabama. Somebody said he knew 
of such eels, in the Pacific Ocean. 
Piles of them in the streets — people 



150 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



alarmed — farmers coming with carts, 
and taking them away for fertiliz- 
ing material. 

Our subject has been treated 
scientifically, or too scientifically. 
There have been experiments. I 
have no more of an ill opinion of ex- 
perimental science than I have of 
everything else, but I have been an 
experimenter, myself, and have im- 
pressions of the servile politeness 
of experiments. They have such an 
obliging, or ingratiating, way that 
there’s no trusting the flatterers. In 
the Redruth (Cornwall, England) 
Independent, August 13, and follow- 
ing issues, 1886, correspondents tell 
of a shower of snails near Redruth. 
There were experiments. One cor- 
respondent, who believed that the 
creatures were sea snails, put some 
in salt water. They lived. Another 
correspondent, who believed that 
they were not sea snails, put some 
in salt water. They died. 

London Evening Standard, Jan. 3, 
192<? — red objects falling with snow, 
at Halmstead, Sweden. 

They were red worms, from one 
to four inches in length. Thousands 
of them streaking down with the 
snowflakes — red ribbons in a shower 
of confetti — a carnival scene that 
boosts my discovery that meteor- 
ology is a more picturesque science 
than most persons, including meteor- 
ologists, have suspected. 

But how am I to know whether 
these things fell from the sky in 
Sweden, or were imagined in Swe- 
den? 

I shall be scientific about it. Said 
Sir Isaac Newton — or virtually said 
he— “If there is no change in the di- 
rection of a moving body, the di- 
rection of a moving body is not 
changed.” “But,” continued he, “if 
something be changed, it is changed 
as much as it is changed.” So red 
worms fell from the sky, in Sweden, 



because from the sky, in Sweden, 
red worms fell. How do geologists 
determine the age of rocks? By the 
fossils in them. And how do they 
determine the age of the fossils? 
By the rocks they’re in. Having 
started with the logic of Euclid, I 
go on with the wisdom of a New- 
ton. 

New Orleans Daily Picayune, 
Feb. 4, 1892 — enormous numbers of 
unknown brown worms that had 
fallen from the sky, near Clifton, 
Indiana. San Francisco Chronicle, 
Feb. 14, 1892 — myriads of unknown 
scarlet worms — somewhere in Mas- 
sachusetts — not seen to fall from 
the sky, but found, covering several 
acres, after a snow storm. 

It is as if with intelligence, or 
with the equivalence of intelligence, 
something has specialized upon 
transporting, or distributing, im- 
mature and larval forms of life. If 
the gods send worms, that would be 
kind, if we were robins. 

In Insect Life, 1892, p. 335, the 
editor, Prof. C. V. Riley tells of four 
other mysterious appearances of 
worms, early in the year 1892. Some 
of the specimens he could not defi- 
nitely identify. It is said that at 
Lancaster, Pa., people in a snow 
storm caught falling worms on their 
umbrellas. 

UPON MAY 28TH, 1881, near the 
city of Worcester, England, a fish- 
monger, with a procession of carts, 
loaded with several kinds of crabs 
and periwinkles, and. with a dozen 
energetic assistants, appeared at a 
time when nobody on a busy road 
was looking. The fishmonger and 
his assistants grabbed sacks of peri- 
winkles, and ran in a frenzy, sling- 
ing the things into fields on both 
sides of the road. They raced to 
gardens, and some assistants, stand- 
ing on the shoulders of other assist- 



LO! 



151 



ants, had sacks lifted to them, and 
dumped sacks over the high walls. 
Meanwhile other assistants, in a 
dozen carts, were furiously shovel- 
ling out periwinkles, about a mile 
along the road. Also, meanwhile, 
several boys were busily mixing in 
crabs. They were not advertising 
anything. Above all there was se- 
crecy. The cost must have been 
hundreds of dollars. They appeared 
without having been seen on the 
way, and they melted away equally 
mysteriously. There were houses 
all around, but nobody saw them. 

Would I be so kind as to tell 
what, in the name of some slight ap- 
proximation to sanity, I mean by 
telling such a story? 

But it is not my story. The de- 
tails are mine, but I have put them 
in, strictly in accordance with the 
circumstances. There was, upon 
May 28th, 1881, an occurrence near 
Worcester, and the conventional ex- 
planation was that a fishmonger did 
it. Inasmuch as he did it unob- 
served, if he did it, and inasmuch 
as he did it with tons upon acres, 
if he did it, he did it as I have de- 
scribed, if he did it. 

In Land and Water, June 4, 1881, 
a correspondent writes that, in a 
violent thunderstorm, near Worces- 
ter, tons of periwinkles had come 
down from the sky, covering fields 
and a road, for about a mile. In the 
issue of June 11th, the editor of 
Land and Water writes that speci- 
mens had been sent to him. He 
notes the mysterious circumstance, 
or the indication of a selection of 
living things, that appears in vir- 
tually all the accounts. He com- 
ments upon an enormous fall of sea 
creatures, unaccompanied by sand, 
pebbles, other shells, and sea weed. 

In the Worcester Daily Times, 
May 30, it is said that, upon the 
28th, news had reached Worcester 



of a wonderful fall from the sky, 
of periwinkles on Cromer Gardens 
Road, and spread far around in 
fields and gardens. Mostly, people 
of Worcester were incredulous, but 
some had gone to the place. Those 
who had faith returned with peri- 
winkles. 

Two correspondents then wrote 
that they had seen the periwinkles 
upon the road before the storm, 
where probably a fishmonger had 
got rid of them. So the occurrence 
conventionalized, and out of these 
surmises arose the story of the fish- 
monger, though it has never been 
told before, as I have told it. 

Mr. J. Lloyd Bozward, a writer 
whose notes on meteorological sub- 
jects are familiar to readers of scien- 
tific periodicals of this time, was in- 
vestigating, and his findings were 
published in the Worcester Evening 
Post, June 9th. As to the story of 
the fishmonger, note his statement 
that the value of periwinkles was 
16 shillings a bushel. He says that 
a wide area on both sides of the road 
was strewn with periwinkles, hermit 
crabs, and small crabs of an unas- 
certained species. Worcester is 
about 30 miles from the mouth of 
the River Severn, or say about 50 
miles from the sea. Probably no 
fishmonger in the world ever had, 
at one time, so many periwinkles, 
but as to anybody having got rid of 
a stock, because of a glutted market, 
for instance, Mr. Bozward says: 
“Neither upon Saturday, the 28th, 
nor Friday, the 27th, was there such 
a thing procurable in Worcester as 
a live periwinkle.” Gardens as well 
as fields were strewn. There were 
high walls around these gardens. 
Mr. Bozward tells of about 10 sacks 
of periwinkles, of a value of about 
£20, in the markets of Worcester, 
that, to his knowledge, had been 
picked up. Crowds had filled pots 



ft 



152 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



and pans and bags and trunks before 
he got to the place. “In Mr. Maund’s 
garden, two sacks were filled with 
them.” It is his conclusion that the 
things fell from the sky during the 
thunderstorm. So his is the whirl- 
wind explanation. 

There are extraordinary occur- 
rences, and conventionalization 
cloaks them, and the more common- 
place the cloakery, the more satis- 
factory. Periwinkles appear upon 
a tract of land, through which there 
is a road. A fishmonger did it. 

But the crabs and the fishmonger 
— and if the fishmonger did the peri- 
winkles, did he do the crabs, if he 
did it? 

Or the crabs and the whirlwind — 
and, if the periwinkles were segre- 
gated from pebbles and sea weed, 
why not from the crabs, if segrega- 
tion did it? 

The strongest point for the seg- 
regationists is in their own mental 
processes, which illustrate that seg- 
regations, whether by wind action, 
or not, do occur. If they have peri- 
winkles and crabs to explain, and, 
say, that with a story of a fishmon- 
ger, or of a whirlwind, they can ex- 
plain the periwinkles, though so 
they cannot explain the crabs, a 
separation of data occurs in their 
mentalities. They forget the crabs 
and tell of the periwinkles. 

II. 

ROGS AND FISHES and 
1 worms — and these are the ma- 
terials of our expression upon 
all things. 

Hops and flops and squirms — and 
these are the motions. 

But we have been considering 
more than matter and motion, to 
start with: we have been consider- 
ing attempts by scientists to explain 
them. By explanation, I mean or- 



ganization. There is more than mat- 
ter and motion in our existence, 
there is organization of matter and 
motion. 

Nobody takes a little clot that is 
central in a disease germ, as Abso- 
lute Truth; and the latest scientific 
discovery is only something for 
ideas to systematize around. But 
there is this systematization, or or- 
ganization, and we shall have to con- 
sider it. 

There is no more meaning — though 
that may be utmost meaning — to ar- 
rangements of observations, than 
there is to arrangements of proto- 
plasm in a microbe, but it must be 
noted that scientific explanations do 
often work out rather well — but say 
in medical treatments, if ailments 
are mostly fancied; or in stock-mar- 
ket transactions, except in a crisis; 
or in expert testimony in the courts, 
except when set aside by other ex- 
pert testimony — 

But they are based upon defini- 
tions — 

And in phenomenal existence 
there is nothing that is independent 
of everything else. Given that there 
is Continuity, everything is a de- 
gree or aspect of whatever every- 
thing else is. Consequently there is 
no way of defining anything, except 
in terms of itself. Try any alleged 
definition. What is an island? An 
island is a body of land completely 
surrounded by water. And what is 
a body of land that is completely 
surrounded by water? 

Among savage tribesmen, there is 
a special care for, or even respect- 
fulness for, the mentally afflicted. 
They are regarded as in some ob- 
scure way representing God’s 
chosen. We recognize the defining 
of a thing in terms of itself, as a 
sign of feeble-mindedness. All 
scientists begin their works with 
just such definitions, implied, if not 



LO! 



153 



stated. And among our tribes there 
is a special care for, or even respect- 
fulness for, scientists. 

It will be an expression of mine 
that there is a godness in this idiocy. 
But, no matter what sometimes my 
opinion may be, I am not now writ- 
ing that God is an Idiot. Maybe 
he, or it, drools comets and gibbers 
earthquakes,' but the scale would 
have to be considered at least super- 
idiocy. 

I conceive, or tell myself that I 
conceive, that if we could have a 
concept of our existence as a whole, 
we could have a kind of understand- 
ing of it, rather akin to what, say, 
cells in an animal organism could 
have of what is a whole to them, if 
they should not be mere scientists, 
trying to find out what a bone is, or 
the flow of blood in a vein is, in it- 
self; but if they could comprehend 
what the structures and functions of 
the Organism are, in terms of It- 
self. 

The attempted idea of Existence 
as Organism is one of the oldest of 
the pseudo-thoughts of philosophy. 
But the idea in this book is not 
metaphysical. Metaphysical specu- 
lations are attempts to think un- 
thinkably, and it is quite hard 
enough to think thinkably. There 
can be nothing but bafflement for 
anybody who tries to think of Exist- 
ence as Organism: our attempt will 
be to think of an existence as an 
organism. Having a childish liking 
for a little rhetoric, now and then, 
I shall call it God. 

Our expressions are in terms of 
Continuity. If all things merge 
away into one another, or transmute 
into one another, so that nothing 
can be defined, they are of a one- 
ness, which may be the oneness of 
one existence. I state that, though 
I accept that there is continuity, I 
accept that also there is discontinu- 



ity. But there is no need, in this 
book, to go into the subject of con- 
tinuity-discontinuity, because no 
statement that I shall make, as a 
monist, will be set aside by my plu- 
ralism. There is a Oneness that 
both submerges and individualizes. 

By the continuity of all things we 
have, with a hop and a flop and a 
squirm, jumped from frogs toward 
finality. We have rejected whirl- 
winds and the fishmonger, and have 
incipient nations upon a selective- 
ness and an intelligent, or purpose- 
ful, distribution of living things. 

What is selecting and what is 
distributing? 

The old-fashioned theologian 
thinks of a being, with the looks of 
himself, standing aside somewhere 
and directing operations. 

What, in any organism, is select- 
ing and distributing — say oxygen in 
lungs, and materials in stomachs? 

The organism itself. 

If we can think of our existence 
as a conceivable-sized formation — 
perhaps one of countless things, be- 
ings, or formations in the cosmos — 
we have graspableness, or we have 
the outlines and the limits within 
which to think. 

We look up at the stars. The 
look is of a revolving shell that is 
not far away. And against such a 
view there is no opposition except 
by an authoritative feeble-minded- 
ness, which most of us treat respect- 
fully, because such is the custom in 
all more or less savage tribes. 

III. 

T HE SUBJECT of reported 
falls from the sky, of an 
edible substance, in Asia 
Minor, is confused, because reports 
have been upon two kinds of sub- 
stances. It seems that the sugar- 
like kind cannot be accepted. In 



154 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



July, 1927, the Hebrew University 
of Jerusalem sent an expedition to 
the Sinai Peninsula to investigate 
reported showers of “manna.” See 
the New York Times, Dec. 4, 1927. 
Members of the expedition found 
what they called “manna” upon 
leaves of tamarisk trees, and on the 
ground underneath, and explained 
that it was secreted by insects. But 
the observations of this expedition 
have nothing to do with data, or 
stories, of falls from the sky of 
fibrous, convoluted lumps of a sub- 
stance that can be ground into an 
edible flour. A dozen times, since 
early in the 19th century — and I 
have no definitely dated data upon 
still earlier occurrences — have been 
reported showers of “manna” in Asia 
Minor. 

An early stage within the shell of 
an egg — and a photoplasmic line of 
growth feels out through surround- 
ing substance — and of itself it has 
no means of subsistence, or of itself 
jt is lost. Nourishment and protec- 
tion and guidance come to it from 
the whole. 

Or, in wider existence — several 
thousand years ago — a line of fugi- 
tives feels out in a desert. It will 
be of use to coming social organi- 
zations. But in the desert, it is un- 
provided for and is withering. Food 
falls from the sky. 

It is one of the most commonplace 
of miracles. Within any womb an 
embryonic thing is unable to pro- 
vide for itself, but “manna” is sent 
to it. Given an organic view of an 
existence, we think of the super- 
vision of a whole upon its parts. 

Or that once upon a time, a whole 
responded to the need of a part, and 
then kept on occasionally showering 
“manna” thousands of years after a 
special need for it had ceased. This 
looks like stupidity. It is in one of 
my moments of piety that I say this, 



because, though in our neo-theology 
there is no worship, I note that in 
this conception of what we call god- 
ness, I supply grounds for devo- 
tions. Let a god change anything, 
and there will be reactions of evil 
as much as of good. Only stupidity 
can be divine. 

Or occasional falls of “manna,” 
to this day, in Asia Minor, may be 
only one factor in a wider continu- 
ance. It may be that an Organism, 
having once showered a merely 
edible substance upon its chosen 
phenomena, has been keeping this 
up, as a symbol of favoritism, by 
which said chosen phenomena have 
been receiving abundances of 
“manna” in many forms, ever since. 

The substance that occasionally 
falls from the sky, in Asia Minor, 
comes from far away. The occur- 
rences are far apart, in time, and 
always the substance is unknown 
where it falls, and its edibleness is 
sometimes found out by the sight of 
sheep eating it. Then it is gathered 
and sold in the markets. We are 
told that it had been identified as a 
terrestrial product. We are told 
that these showers are aggregations 
of Lecanora esculenta, a lichen that 
grows plentifully in Algeria. We 
are told that whirlwinds catch up 
these lichens, lying loose, or easily 
detachable, on the ground. But note 
this: 

There have been no such reported 
showers in Algeria. 

There have been no such reported 
showers in places between Algeria 
and Asia Minor. 

THE NEAREST similarity I can 
think of is of tumble weeds, in the 
Western States, though tumble 
weeds are much larger. Well, then, 
new growths of them, when they’re 
not much larger. But I have never 
heard of a shower of tumble weeds. 



LO! 



155 



Probably the things are often carried 
far by whirlwinds, but only scoot 
along the ground. A story that 
would be similar to stories of lichens, 
from Algeria, falling in Asia Minor, 
would be of tumble weeds, never 
falling in showers, in Western 
States, but repeatedly showering in 
Ontario, Canada, having been car- 
ried there by whirlwinds. 

Out of a dozen records, I men- 
tion that, in Nature, 43-255, and in 
La Nature, 36-82, are accounts of 
one of the showers, in Asia Minor. 
The Director of the Central Dispen- 
sary of Bagdad had sent to France 
specimens of an edible substance 
that had fallen from the sky, at 
Meridin, and at Diarbekis (Turkey 
in Asia) in a heavy rain, the last of 
May, 1890. They were convoluted 
lumps, yellow outside and white in- 
side. They were ground into flour 
from which excellent bread was 
made. According to the ready-made 
convention, botanists said that the 
objects were specimens of Lecanora 
esculenta lichens that had been car- 
ried in a whirlwind. 

London Daily Mail, Aug. 13, 1913 
— that streets in the town of Kirk- 
manshaws, Persia, had been covered 
with seeds, which the people 
thought were the manna of biblical 
times. The Royal Botanical Society 
had been communicated with, and 
had explained that the objects had 
been carried from some other part 
of this earth’s surface, by a whirl- 
wind. “They were white in sub- 
stance, and of a consistency of In- 
dian corn.” 

I believe nothing. I have shut 
myself away from the rocks and wis- 
doms of ages, and from the so-called 
great teachers of all time, and per- 
haps because of that isolation I am 
given to bizarre hospitalities. I 
shut the front door upon Einstein, 
and at the back door hold out a wel- 



coming hand to little frogs and peri- 
winkles. I believe nothing of my 
own that I have ever written. I can- 
not accept the products of minds are 
subject-matter for beliefs. But I 
accept, with reservations that give 
me freedom to ridicule the state- 
ment at any other time, that showers 
of an edible substance that has not 
been traced to an origin upon this 
earth, have fallen from the sky, in 
Asia Minor. 

There have been suggestions that 
unknown creatures and unknown 
substances have been trasported to 
this earth from other fertile worlds, 
or from other parts of one system, 
or organism, a composition of dis- 
tances that are small relatively to 
the unthinkable spans that astron- 
omers think they can think of. 
There have been suggestions of a 
purposeful distribution in this exist- 
ence. Purpose in Nature is think- 
able, without conventional theo- 
logical interpretations, if we can 
conceive of our existence, or the so- 
called solar system, and the stars 
around, as one organic state, forma- 
tion, or being. I can make no de- 
marcation between the organic, or 
the functional, and the purposeful. 
When, in an animal organism, osteo- 
blasts appear and mend a broken 
bone, they represent purpose, 
whether they know what they’re 
doing or not. Any adapation may 
be considered an expression of pur- 
pose, if by purpose we mean noth- 
ing but intent upon adaptation. If 
we can think of our whole existence, 
perhaps one of countless organisms 
in the cosmos, as one organism, we 
can call its functions and distribu- 
tions either organic or purposeful, 
or mechanically purposeful. 

Next month, Charles Fort digs 
deeper into his hie of phenomena 
that present-day science cannot ex- 
plain. Make sure of your copy! 




We’re Keeping Them 

Dear Editor: 

I used to be an Astounding Stories 
fan. I purchased every issue from the 
first except the last issue of the old A. S. 
But by that time I was becoming rather 
disgusted with it. The magazine was dete- 
riorating rapidly. The good authors it had 
were deserting it, and the ones who 
stayed were turning in mediocre stories. 
Then I saw a copy published under the 
banner of Street & Smith, which I knew 
to be a sign of good literature. I bought 
that copy and was delighted to see a 
decided change for the better. Only the 
best of the old authors were back and 
there were several good new ones. I 
like the idea of a few weird tales along 
with the science. 

Since that first number, each issue has 
been better than the previous one. I don’t 
see how you do it. How about letting us 
know the editor’s name? I would like to 
see John Hanson again. I would prefer 
a magazine with no serials, but the serials 
you have published so far are up to the 
standard of the magazine. 

Besides obliging us with a dandy read- 
ers’ department, and improving your art 
work from month to month, you now give 
us “thought-variant” stories. Who could 
ask for more? That is what decided me 
to buy A. S. whether I bought any other 
science-fiction magazine or not. Ances- 
tral Voices was delightful. What do you 



say now, you “grandfather-killers”? And 
Colossus was magnificent. I wrote a 
story on that very theme over a year ago, 
but I couldn’t handle the idea anything 
like so well as he did. Keep it up. 

Be sure to keep Diffin, Coblentz, Wand- 
rei, Williamson, Locke, and, above all, 
my old favorite, Schachner, who is better 
than ever without his partner. 

This is all for the present. I don’t ex- 
pect you can print this, or at least not 
all of it, but at least I’m letting you know 
that you have a satisfied reader in — Don- 
ald Allgeier, Springfield, Missouri. 

Praise for Brown 

Dear Editor: 

Though I may not be the first to con- 
gratulate you on the new Astounding Sto- 
ries magazine, I know I shall not be the 
last. It is deserving of all the praise it 
receives. 

Although I did not get the October 
issue, not knowing it was on the stands, 
I did get the November issue, and have 
gotten all the following issues up to now, 
none of which were disappointing. 

I particularly liked Ancestral Voices in 
the December issue and Farewell to 
Earth (though a sequel to the latter 
•would be very welcome). The cover was 
good. 

The cover on your January issue was 
a swell one. Even though other readers 
may clamor for Wesso or some one else. 



BRASS TACKS 



157 



I think that Mr. Brown ought to hold 
his job on the strength of that cover 
alone. 

As to the stories in the January issue, 
Colossus was truly colossal. I’m for 
Donald Wandrei one hundred percent. 
Redmask of the Outlands I didn’t like so 
very much, but the rest were good. 

I’ve just finished reading the February 
issue and must say that Astounding Sto- 
ries is certainly ringing the bell with 
every issue. Lost City of Mars was great 
and Rebirth promises to be another one 
of those stories that one reads over again 
for the second time. I liked all the 
others, too, that is all except Scandal in 
the Fourth Dimension; not exactly 
science-fiction to my way of thinking. 

As to “weird,” it seems to me that the 
space taken up by such stories might be 
put to a better use, although if a touch 
of scientific reasoning and reasons are 
added to them they are all right. 

The serials have been good and prob- 
ably will continue so, but two parts 
is enough; please don’t increase their 
number. 

And now I’ve got to wait another light- 
year for the next issue.— George J. 
Dutcher, 326 Main St., Bristol, Conn. 

Correspondents Wanted 

Dear Editor: 

I am writing to say hip-hip-hurray! for 
the new Astounding Stories; and having 
read it since 1931, I think I can judge. 

One thing — where is Ray Cummings? 
His stories are what first tempted me 
into reading Astounding. Beyond the 
Vanishing Point was an excellent story. 
It appeared in 1932, I think, and I am sure 
we all would appreciate more like it. 

I would welcome all people who would 
like to correspond with me, exchanging 
ideas and theories. 

Although I am one of the weaker sex, 
I add my good wishes of long life and 
success to Astounding Stories. — Marianne 
Ferguson, 20 South Buffum Street, Wor- 
cester, Massachusetts. 

“Black Eagle” vs. Tucker! 

Dear Editor: 

Thanks very much for the quick re- 
sponse to my letter in the January issue. 
The black cover was unsurpassed by any 
I’ve seen yet. 

Redmask of the Outlands, in my opin- 
ion, was the best story in that issue, with 



The Flame from Mars taking the short 
story honors. 

Please find enclosed a post card that 
was sent me a few days ago, urging me 
into an argument over the color of space. 
The sender, instead of revealing his name, 
hid behind an array of initials and the 
alias “Black Eagle.” Then he finishes 
off with “A.” Now I will gladly go into 
an argument on this subject, through your 
column (as he suggests) or privately, if 
Mr. Black Eagle will come out in the 
open as to who he is, but as long as he 
stays behind the mysterious veil of let- 
ters and lodge names, it’s “no go.” — Bob 
Tucker, Box 260, Bloomington, Illinois. 

Here’s the Post Card 

Mr. Tucker: 

It seems that I must disagree with you. 
In your letter to that great magazine, 
Astounding Stories, you told them to 
print a cover with a space ship and to 
make space black. It so happens that 
space is not black but a deep purple. I 
don’t think Telegraph Plateau was the 
best story either, but Dead Star Station. 
But of course, everybody has his own 
opinion. If you wish to communicate, 
send a letter to Astounding Stories and 
have them publish it in their Brass Tacks. 
—A. N. O. B. E. S. S., Black Eagle. A. 

We Think He’s Better 

Dear Editor: 

Your excellent publication is improv-' 
ing by leaps and bounds. Believe it or 
not, you’re making a real magazine out 
of this one, and no fooling about it. H. V. 
Brown’s cover painting is suggestive of 
Wesso’s works. Not a bit bad, although 
his inside drawings are not so good. I 
would still like to see Wesso do the illus- 
trating. But after all, you’re the editor, 
so I guess I might as well keep still on 
the subject. Rebirth is a mighty fine 
piece of writing. Harl Vincent’s story 
hits the spot too. In fact, practically all 
the stories are worth mentioning. May 
you prosper with this worth-while maga- 
zine. — Olon F. Wiggins, 2603 Curtis 
Street, Denver, Colorado. 

The “Weird” Question 

Dear Editor: 

A few words about Astounding Stories. 
You seem to be hitting a good stride, but 
say, I do hope you’re not going to drop 
the weird element altogether. This would 



158 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



be a very bad move, as science-fiction is 
gravely in need of a fantastic strain. For 
the life of me I can’t figure out why some 
readers dislike weird narratives. Actively 
dislike them. Paradox plus! — Lester An- 
derson, Peralta Street, Hayward, Cal. 

Longer Stories Here Now 

Dear Editor: 

If Astounding Stories has not already 
surpassed the old magazine, I am positive 
that it will do so in the near future. 
Astounding, the newest science-fiction 
magazine, has already beaten the oldest 
so-called “aristocrat” magazine of sci- 
ence-fiction. The stories are improving 
more and more with each issue. 

Howard V. Brown is a good cover 
artist, but he has yet to beat Wesso. I 
suggest that you have a different colored 
background on each issue for a variety. 
When you use a scene in space, use a true 
black and not a reddish black as on the 
latest issue. Remember also that there 
are stars visible in space. I like the 
more pronounced block letter title now 
used. The lettering used for the story 
titles on the cover is also nice looking. 

Lost City of Mars is a great tale. Our 
old favorites can still do their stuff. 

I like the thought-variant stories. 
They’re unusual, different! I wish Re- 
birth had been published complete as a 
long novelette. 

The Living Flame contains good mate- 
rial for a book-length novel. How about 
a sequel? 

Let’s have more humorous stories like 
Scandal in the Fourth Dimension. 

Please give us more and longer novel- 
ettes and book-length serials. Don’t ham- 
per your authors by placing length limits 
on the stories. 

Keep the editor’s page. It’s interesting. 
Improve the interior of the magazine by 
using better-looking lettering for the 
titles. Marchioni is the best of your 
illustration artists. Use him more often. 
Add Paul, Winter and Wesso if possible. 
You will then have a great staff of artists. 
Thanks for giving us names of stories to 
come next month. I hope you will be 
able to add more pages and to have your 
ads on a separate section. — Jack Darrow, 
4224 N. Sawyer Av., Chicago, 111. 

Mr. Brown’s Blushing 

Dear Editor: 

Horrors! The Martian sky lord knows 
that almost anything Astounding could 



do would be all right by me, but, too 
much is too much! 

I beg of you, look at the cover on your 
February, 1934, magazine. While H. V. 
Brown is an excellent illustrator, he has 
a screw loose somewhere. And whoever 
passes on the drawings also is dizzy with 
the Mercurian Menace. 

The man on the left — look at his hand. 
I pray you, look at it — then look in a 
mirror. Is your face red? 

The thumb on the gentleman’s left hand 
is on the outside, not the inside, of his 
hand! If he has his hand turned around, 
how come the palm is toward the front? 
Either his thumb or his palm is quite mis- 
placed. And even should it be the poor 
man’s singular misfortune to be so con- 
structed, how can we believe that a stolen 
space suit is cut to meet this deformity, 
or, if all the space suits were cut that 
way, the man being O. K., how is it that 
the other space suit is all right? 

Astounding can do almost anything and 
it is O. K. with me, but even all the ob- 
scure scientific explanations in the world 
could not explain away this error. 

I have a complete collection of As- 
tounding from Vol. I, No. 1, to the cur- 
rent issue and think that the February, 
1934, issue (cover excepted) is the best 
ever published for all around excellence, 
and believe me, I’ve read ’em all. — Jesse 
H. Day, 907 N. E. Going Street, Portland, 
Oregon. 

How About the Second Part? 

Dear Editor: 

I was certainly glad to see the return 
of Astounding Stories. 

There has been a great improvement in 
the magazine since the November issue. 
If the October issue was as bad as all the 
letters to Brass Tacks would seem to in- 
dicate, I’m glad I missed it. The im- 
provement has been so great that the 
letters in the February Brass Tacks com- 
plain about such little things as how you 
arrange the cover or how the table of 
contents is put together. I don’t blame 
the readers for their brickbats about the 
illustrations, but they seem to have im- 
proved in the last two issues. 

Farewell to Earth certainly calls for a 
sequel or a series of stories. It wouldn’t 
be right to leave Ellayn and Web leaving 
Earth for the golden star beyond Ursa 
Major. The first part of Rebirth is great, 
but will the second be as good? Colossus 
was a great story, but trying to imagine 
the atom is a swell way to realize how 



BRASS TACKS 



159 



small you really are. Ancestral Voices 
was good, but I think inferior to the sec- 
ond two thought-variants. Why not re- 
new the Science Forum? The new As- 
tounding is as good or better than the old 
except for the illustrations. 

Keep the new Astounding at the top of 
the science-fiction pile. — Oliver Davis, 
Big Pine, California. 

Rebirth — Thought-Stimulator 

Dear Editor: 

I wish to add my endorsement to the 
new Astounding. I was very sorry when 
you stopped its publication. 

The new A. S., however, is showing a 
decided improvement, especially the in- 
troduction of some constructive fiction 
along economic lines. I wish to compli- 
ment Rebirth by Thomas Calvert Mc- 
Clary. Writers along constructive lines 
of social justice might improve the value 
of their educational work by staging such 
stories upon some other planet. People 
can never see their own faults, but they 
would readily see the faults of earth’s 
social arrangement, if the writer would 
stage our social order on some other 
planet. I am with you on making A. S. 
the greatest thought-stimulator in the 
world. 

Go to it, you writers who dare to ex- 
plore an atom and find within a world of 
beauty! — J. L. Stark, Tyler Hotel, Louis- 
ville, Ky. 

In Search of an Argument 

Dear Editor: 

I can’t wait any longer, not even to 
read the stories in the February issue, to 
tell you my opinions of the new Astound- 
ing. Glad it’s back, and think it’s easily 
beating the old. Have much commenda- 
tion for your editorial policy. 

The thought-variant idea in your stories 
is really excellent! It gives spice and 
stimulus to the magazine. 

Then, of course, no science-fiction mag- 
azine is complete without a readers’ col- 
umn. Like a dog without a bone; like 
Ed Hamilton without his exclamation 
points or Clark Ashton Smith without the 
word abysmal. But, seriously, it’s most 
interesting to analyze the opinions of 
others (and one’s own, too) and make 
comparisons. And Brass Tacks, which I 
see is growing, will provide an outlet for 
debate and thought brought on by those 
thought-variants. One thing, be sure and 
keep it up to date. 



And here’s another good feature of 
your publication: A feature without which 
any magazine would soon grow dull — 
variety! Don’t forget that. 

Glad to see you are ceasing to print 
weird fiction. We science-fiction fans are 
funny that way in not wanting weird sto- 
ries. But after all, practically the only 
link between weird and science-fiction is 
that quality of strangeness, of being dif- 
ferent. I suppose weird fiction is fasci- 
nating to its adherents, but therein lies 
its only objective — entertainment. Sci- 
ence-fiction idealizes much that is high; 
weird fiction emphasizes horror, gro- 
tesqueness, perverseness and fear of the 
unknown, which is the basis of the relig- 
ions and psychology of all primitive 
tribes and which will continue to drag 
down and keep down any race of people 
till it is banished, and there comes in its 
place open-mindedness, fearless and intel- 
ligent search after truth, thankful and 
reverent worship of deity, with a goal 
always ahead, a goal to be gained by serv- 
ice and cooperation. Science-fiction aims, 
of course, to entertain, but also to in- 
struct, to foster broad-mindedness, to 
point the way to better things, and to 
teach and cause to think. 

As for the illustrators, let me say that 
you don’t need any others than those you 
have now. However, if you’ll look at 
the illustrations for the following stories, 
I’m sure there’ll be some who’ll agree 
with me that they are the best and that 
all the illustrations should at least meas- 
ure up to that standard. Wells Of The 
Brain, Fire Imps, Sphinxes’ Cave, Plane 
People, Terror Out Of Time, Redmask, 
Colossus, Flame From Mars, Short-Wave 
Castle and Living Flame. December and 
January covers were swell! 

Now for the stories themselves. For 
only four issues of a magazine the list 
of excellent ones is large. But first, I 
must digress again a bit. Science-fiction 
itself may be divided into three parts — 
strict s. f., that is, romanticized science, 
fantasy, and adventure. The s. f. stories 
we know and like so well are built either 
on a basis of strict s. f. with fantasy 
added or just as often on a basis of fan- 
tasy with strict s. f. as explanation, all 
this touched with a vein of adventure, and 
told entertainingly and well, with one 
important thing brought out — human na- 
ture. Of course, the boundary lines are 
indefinite, but frequently we come upon 
a tale that is almost wholly strict s. f. or 
almost wholly fantasy, and, very often, 



160 



ASTOUNDING STORIES 



one that is nothing but adventure camou- 
flaged with pseudo-scientific background, 
weapons, etc. I hold nothing whatever 
against this latter type of story, except 
that you keep it out of the new Astound- 
ing. Nor am I talking of interplanetary 
yarns, some of which, though, do belong 
to this class. However, fantasy and 
imagination are integral parts of science- 
fiction, which would indeed be dull with- 
out them. 

The following stories I considered the 
best, really excellent: Coffin Ship, Race 

Through Time, Plane People, Redmask, 
Colossus, Land Of The Lost, followed 
closely by Sphinxes’ Cave, Demon Of 
The Flower, Farewell to Earth, Terror 
Out Of Time. 

These stories I thought very mediocre, 
but of course that is merely my opinion: 
Fire Imps, Telegraph Plateau, Dead Star 
Station, Invading Blood Stream, Ances- 
tral Voices, Flame From Mars, Breath Of 
The Comet, Confession Of De Kalb, 
World Flight. 

The stories I actively objected to: 
Orange God, Prisms Of Space, Purple 
Brain, Machine That Knew Too Much. 

Now a few last lines. You certainly 
are starting out with a vim: Beyond 
Sphinxes’ Cave, Plane People, Farewell 
To Earth, Colossus all need sequels, and 
possibly Land Of The Lost. Why did 
you print Hal Wells’ Purple Brain? He 
had Cavern Of The Shining Ones in the 
November ’32 Astounding, exactly the 
same story but vastly superior. Get Peter 
Gordon to write another story, this time 
s. f., for his style is most wonderfully 
entertaining. World Flight had a plot 
that walks with a cane and puts its teeth 
in water every night. 

Well, I hope my letter has not been 
tedious, if it has been long. Would like 
to see some good stiff arguments in Brass 
Tacks. Editors: Keep up that high 



standard — “a magazine worthy of the best 
literary traditions.” 

Let’s have some poetry. — William H. 
Dellenback, 1335 Rosedale Ave., Chicago, 
111 . 

“A Careful Balance” 

Dear Editor: 

It has been several years since I bought 
one of your magazines, but I have the 
January issue, and I want to tell you that 
I was pleasantly surprised at the big im- 
provement. I am frankly glad that Street 
& Smith got it if they are responsible for 
the improved quality of its stories. 

Colossus is a wow of a story and all 
the scientific explanations necessary are 
woven into it without hurting the story 
value one iota. The denouement is just 
right. Why work up a sweat to explain 
the hero’s return to a world which he 
could not possibly have located either in 
time or in space when such a thing is 
unnecessary? Mr. Wandrei has seen this 
plainly and has thus lifted his story above 
other stories of a similar character which 
were mediocre through failing to perceive 
tin's one thing. Do it again, Mr. Wand- 
rei I 

Redmask of the Outlands — a swell ac- 
tion story as she should be wrote with 
a surprise denouement which is pro- 
tected magnificently until the end. 

The Confession of Dr. De Kalb — fine — 
but don’t let the purely scientific type 
displace those in which story value and 
plot mean something too. If you keep a 
careful balance in this respect you will 
undoubtedly win over the fan readers of 
certain of your competitors who do not 
watch this point so closely. 

On the other hand, don’t print such 
outlandishly impossible stories as you 
have sometimes done in the past. Keep 
them plausible, at least. — J. L. Winks, 
7817 East End Ave., Chicago, Illinois. 



Thought-variant ! 

THE BLINDING SHADOWS 
by Donald Wandrei 
In the May issue of 

ASTOUNDING STORIES 



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Good Meals are not an 

Accident/ 

COMPANY WILL SHOWER PRAISE 
ON THE HOUSEWIFE WHO 

PLANS HER TABLE 

Yours can be the object of praise 



Favorite 
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Please mention this magazine when answering advertisements 



Try Some of These Remarkable Seed Novelties ""sm 




JAPANESE ROSE BUSHES 



The Wonder of the World 

Japanese Rose Bushes bloom all th® year round. Just 
think of it. Six weeks after planting the seed, the plants will 
be in f sail bloom. It may not seem possible, but we posi- 
„ tively guarantee St to be so. They will bloom ©very 
ten weates, Summer or Winter, and when three years old the 
bush will be a mass of res®©* bearing from five hundred to 
a thousand roses on each bush. The flowers are in three shades 
—white, pink, and crimson. The plants will do well both in ana 
©ut doors. We guarantee at least three bushes to grow from each 
packet of seed. Price, SLOc packet, 3 pkts. for 25c postpaid. 



Chinese Fragrant free Fern 

Just Introduced: noted for 
Its rapid growth . An ex- 
ceptionally pretty .orna- 
mental plant. Foliage is rich 
dark green. Forma grand 
pyramidal bushes about 
fi feet high. Branches very 
desirable for decorative 
purposes, wreaths, etc. 
Seeds ?5c pEit. 3 ' 




Weather Plant 



GftOUND ALMONDS 



' Amiitgly Prolilio-i Easily Smwn Frara Soesi 

The Ground Almond has a flavor that is MOST 
EXCELLENT, resembling the cocoanut. The 
meat is snow white, covered with a shell or skin 
©f brown color. It grows close to the surface 
snd anything from 200 to 300 Almonds may be 

expected from a single nut. There is no trouble whatever 



WATWRE’S WEATHER PROPHET 
By mysterious changes that taka 
pi ace, this remarkable plant accu- 
rately forecasts the weathex 
many hourB in advance. Will 
grow anywhere all the year 
around. An interesting house 
plant. Bears large, fragrant, 

pink, butterfly shape flowers. 

Sessds* tSe packed 3 Jes ■ 40©. postpaid 



8 1 

I 

■ 

i 



you will hove an ENORM O US CROP cf tl 
CHOU3 ALMONDS YOU EVER TASTED. 

Perfume 
Plant 

Blooms only at 
night.giving forth 
the most delight- 
ful scented fra- 
grance for quite 




ae.Ceuaeo 
r garden, 
i perfume 



9 a distance. 

much comment." 1 For bouse or 
Also valuable because of rare _ 
made from it. SEED8,t0opitt.,3for2So 

Caiatiash or Pip® gourds 

. . A luxuriant and rapid 

. TOBjtK # growing climber ; 

%fr 




calabash pipes are made, 
tereating vine and makeyoL 
with Instructions, 13© pkt, 3 ff 





SENSITIVE 
PLANT 

Marvel ef the Philip- 
pines. Leaves curl, 
fronds droop when 
touched. Apparently 
resents Interference. 
A handsome shrub for house or 
garden; very curious and Interest- 
ing. Seuds, 15c phi., 3 for 40c. 

Japanese Neat Egg fionnS 




eame a I a e , 
shape anc 
color of nest 
eggs. Matured 
fruit does not 
crack. Will 
serveforyeara 
as a nest egg, 
stocking darn- 
er. ornamen- 
tal purposes, 

EaateSSs SW..3 eto ta «5fcJ.S.S,C0. 



Mammoth' Peanuts- 

Peanuts can be easily cultivated. Their culture is 
very simple and, exceedingly interesting. Mammoth 



BEMARKABLE FIREFLYPUNT Blooms at Night 

Fills the Atmosphere with Fragrant Aroma 

One of Jim most rapid growing vines knovra^tfader^vor- 
space of time 




Bble conditions' tbls”vine“haa been known to grow OVER 25 
FEET IN A SINGLE WEEK. In a very short space of time 
Indeed the Vine has climbed to a great height, and Is covered 



with IMMENSE FLOWERS, from 6 to 7 inches in diameter. 
It la, indeed, agreat novelty, for, unlike other plants, the 
flowers OPEftf IN THE EVENING, and remain open until 
ebout noon the following day. In dull weather they will re- 
main open all day. It la a most INTERESTING SIGHT to 
watch the opening and closing of the flowers as the clouds 

S pear and disperse. As the flowers open they give forth 
a most DELIGHTFUL AROMA and the whole atmosphere 
around is full of scented fragrance. It is always the object 
cf favorable comment, and much curiosity is aroused by peo- 
ple passing at night rime as to 1.he cause oi the Onarmln* 
frequently stopping Cajon andeavor^to sat isfy th^g^cariog.ity.^ .PRICE; 

" * * s ' ~ JUnfto 1 



lSRSUn?i^tXSS^ VSmUS&~mm * SMITH A 00. 

ntSmMmMwif ^ 

A luscious 




be grown and 
ripened from 
seed In any 
soil or climate 
In ^months. 
The flavor Is 
fine and on- 

. . surpassed for 

eating raw, cooked, canned or preserved 
In any form. The fruit fo blue-black in 
color, and tastes like a luscious, rich 
blueberry. One bush will produce an 
enormous amount cf fruit, yielding great 
masses of rich fruit all Summer and Fall. 
Pasbet, 10c, 3 olvts. tor 25c, postpaid* 



\ 

l 



A very remarkable Bot- 
anical curiosity you should 
have. Though quite odor- 
less it is said flics will not 
remaiain a room where it ia 
grown. Bears very pretty 
bloeaomo; blooms summer 
and winter. Grows rapidly from seed. 
SEEDS >5e pkt.; 3 for 40c, postpaid. 

Banana ffefc: Meioa 

Quite a curiosity* 
Looks and smelts like 

a banana. Peculiar 

shape and its delicious flavor make it well 
worth your while cultivating. Fwsh is 
deep and of exquisite flavor. .Very high 
prices are obtained in choice city markets* 
as high ns a dollar sometimes being de- 
maadad for one single specimen. Seeds 
10©, 3 pkts. for 25c- 

!i!ap2iie83 Umbrella Palm Conservatory Pianl 

Easily Crowjfi From ScgsS Winter or Summer 

Tha Japanese Umbrella Palm Is a seml-aoaatic plant. 

It Is easily grown from seed either In a bowl of wa-er or 
In very damp soil. Probably the most usual, as well an 
the most interesting method. Is to cultivate the piant in 
a bowl or jardiniere filled with water, witn two or three 
Inches of good garden soil at the bottom. The eoedfl 
soon commence to germinate, and the plant shoots up 
stems two to three feet high and rapidly assumes a most 
pretty palm-like appearance , as shown m the engraving. 

The tops of the stems are surmounted by a wnorl of urn- 

culture, for ©nly 15c or three packets for 40c postp 

Butterfly’s Own Bush 

sow. This plant la • 

veritable refuge 
or haven for but- 





Peanuts grow to an. astonishing size. It is a good pro- 
ducer, very prolific, and the slant nut:® have a thick, 
heavily ribbed protecting shell. The plant is very 
" - *- shape ana 



, the "leaves being .of odd 

a handsome green shade, tinted through the 

center with white. You will derive much pleasure cultivating 

this interesting species. Seed* 15c pkt.. 3 nkts. toe 40c. 




Musk Plant 

A universally ad- 
mired favorite 
I for house, flower 
*i garden or green- 
, house. A very 
fine house plant. 
Lives for years. 
Is of the sweet 
scented variety* 
giving forth 
lauoh fragrance. Also valuable on ac- 
count of the perfume that can be made 
from it. Seeds 15c pkt., 3 for 4Qc- 






Japanese Climbing Cucumber 

Unusually 
and vig- 
growing 
vine . Attains 
twice the eisa 
‘ ordinary va- 
ries. Grows 
’Ey on 
poles, 
a, etc . 
_ ill wlil 
an entire 
y supplied 
summer. 

Seeds 15c pacht, 3 for 40c, postpaid. 

GIGANTIC BUTTEB BEANS 

THE HEW EDIBLE VEGETABLE WONDER 
Grows to an astonishing size, the Beans rneaflurinjj 
i from 3 to 6 feet long, and weighing anything, from 
10 to 16 lbs. and even more. One Bean is sntneient 
for a family for several meals . Very palatable ana 
rich In nutritious materials. The deucate Buttery 
Flavor Is much appreciated. The Vines are easily 
grown, very prolific, and a meat welcome and val- 
uable adjunct to your garden. Try them; you will 
find them the most datidci:® vegetable you havo 
.ever tasted. Imported direct. Unobtainable else- 
where. Sample package of Seeds with full direc- 



Kudzu Vine 




i'id cultivating and cooking. 25c* postpaid. 

Yard Long Bean 



Most rapifl growing 
vinejknown. Will grow 
20 feet in one week. 
Luxuriant foliage; 
lovely purple 
flowers; very fra- 
grant. Nothing 
to equal it for 
__ shade purposesand 

> quick growth. 

» 15c packet, 3 for 40c. 




Produces enormous 
crop of long, 
der, round 
excellent 



d pods, of 
t quality 



Very tender and 
fine flavor. The 
vines are rampant 
growers; an inter- 
esting curiosity. 
Seeds 15c pkt., 
3 for 40c 



fcerflies. undid 
attracts all the 
most beautiful 
types of butter- 
flies to the neigh- 
borhood. Bees, 
too, are very 
fond of It. It to 
a pretty plant 
bearing perfectly 
_ing from white to 

, red and pink. Illoo 

other delicate shades. Packet 

10 cents, 3 for 29 cents eostpafch 

CASTUS FROM SEED 

Very curious, ed(J 
looking, strange spe- 
cies of plants; will 
thrive anywhere with 
little or no care. Flow- 
ers are of exquisite 
beauty and delight- 
fully fragrant. You 
will be astonished at 
the odd looks of the 
tOcrau. 



mmm Mexican' 

FIREFLY PLANT 




Shire© packet* far 2S 

FEIN SEED 

Ferns' can fbe grown 
from seed. Try your 
luck growing these beau- 
tiful plants for indoors 
or outdoors. Choicest 
mixed varieties. 





Beautiful hedga 
plant, grows 2 to 2Ji 
feat high and resem- 
bling n closely clip- 
ped ornamental ev- 
ergreen. The globe- 
shaped or pyramidal 
bushes are close and 
compact, and of m 
pleasing l:$ht green color. May bo 
grown singly or In the form of a hedge 
or background. In early autumn the 
whole bush becomes carmine or blood 
rod, hence the name of Mexican Fire 
Plant, or * Burning Bush,” as It la 
eomonmos called. SQlacSoaSfi.9d9.1Q0 

Asparagus 

Spresigerl 

The bestplonft 
for hanging 
baskets. Mas- 
ses oi rich, 
gleaming foli- 
age droop in a 
very graceful 
manner. The fo- 

liage when cut 

for decorative ; purposes will last for 
weeks In water. The seed pods are very 
pretty red berries adding to Its beauty. 
Packet, 25c, 3 pkt*. for65c postpaid 

TREE OF IHiEAVEM 




Novelty from China 
’and should be 
grown in every 
garden. Seems to 
be a cross between 
Celery and Cos Let- 
tuce. Flavor is 
more mild than any 
other cabbaga Can be served 
on the table and eaten raw or 
cooked like cabbage, spinach or 
lettuce or made into salad. 
Grows very rapidly, easy to 
cultivate. You can create quite a sen- 
sation by cultivating this remarkable 

novelty . SM*8,15e packs), 3 pkts. flir 40c. 




. 18 ® 
native of China* 
and ie called the 
Tree of Heaven, on 
account of ite treat 
beauty. Very 
hardy, thrives in 
any ooil, no matter 
how poor, and 
grown from 6to 19 
feet high from 
: oecd tho tint cum- 
mer. The loaves 
fire from 6 to 6 feet in any length, giving 
it a grand appoaranoe. Nothing outside 
the tropics can rival it for lawn decora- 
tion. Large paniolae of bloom, followed 
in season by great clusters of colored 
Boed pods, make the tree a continual 
thing of beauty* Packet, 15c; 3 packets 40o 



SURPRISE FLOWER 6ARDEN of V Mixed FBowsr Seeds 

MANY RARE AND CURIOUS NOVELTIES _ 

Abundance of Flowers Assured Throughout th® Season 

ily grown annuals that bloom very soon after sowing 
, Dmu , vary in their time of blooming. Those who cannot 

e the const ant care necessary for finely arranged flower beds will 
delighted with the Surprise Wild Flower Garden. Will proVe a 
continual surprise and pleasure, «s new varieties 
and the old garden favorites flower successively 
throughout the season. There are over a hun- 
dred varieties of seeds. Many of the plants may 
be taken insldo os house plants and will bloora 
during the winter. Fine for children, also teach- 
ers for school gardens. Packet, 15 cent*, thro* 
packets for 40 cents, Postpaid. J. 5. On CO. 




SSSSfL"" Johnson SmitSi ^€© a W HA€INE,WiS ■ page novelty eatalufl 




ADVERTISING SECTION 



Kill Kidney Acids 

Don’t Take Drastic Drugs 



You have 9 million tiny tubes or filters in your Kidneys, which 
out Acids and poisonous wastes and purifying your blood, which 
times an hour. So it’s no wonder that poorly functioning Kidneys 
may be the real cause of feeling tired, run-down, nervous, Get- 
ting Up Nights, Rheumatic Pains and other troubles. 

Nearly everyone is likely to suffer from poorly functioning 
Kidneys at times because modern foods and drinks, weather 
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often place an extra heavy load on the Kidneys. 

But when your Kidneys need help, don’t take chances with drastic 
or irritating drugs. Be careful. If poorly functioning Kidneys 
or Bladder make you suffer from Getting Up Nights, Leg Pains, 
Nervousness, Stiffness, Burning, Smarting, Itching Acidity, Rheu- 
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eyes, or Dizziness, don’t waste a minute. Try the Doctor’s pre- 
scription Cystex (pronounced Siss-tex). See for yourself the amaz- 
ing quickness with which it soothes, tones and cleans raw, sore 
irritated membranes. 

Cystex is a remarkably successful prescription for poorly func- 
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and many say that in just a day or so it helped them sleep like 
a baby, brought new strength and energy, eased rheumatic pains 
and stiffness — made them feel years younger. Cystex starts cir- 
culating through the system in 15 minutes, helping the Kidneys 
in their work of cleaning out the blood and removing poisonous 
acids and wastes in the system. It does its work quickly and 
positively but does not contain any dopes, narcotics or habit- 
forming drugs. The formula is in every package. 

Because of its amazing and almost world-wide suc- 
cess the Doctor’s Prescription known as Cystex 
(pronounced Siss-tex) is offered to sufferers of 
poor Kidney and Bladder functions under the 
fair-play guarantee to fix you up to your com- 
plete satisfaction or money back on return 
of empty package. It’s only 3c a dose. Ask 
your druggist for Cystex today and see for 
yourself how much younger, stronger and 
better you can feel by simply cleaning out your 
Kidneys. Cystex must do the work or cost 
you nothing. 



are at work night and day cleaning 
circulates through your kidneys 200 




City 



Health Doctor 
Praises Cystex 

Doctors and druggists everywhere approve 
of the prescription Cystex because of ita 
splendid ingredients and quick action. For 
instance. Dr. W. R. George, graduate Med- 
ical Dept., University 
of Indiana, former 
Health Commissioner of 
Indianapolis, and Med- 
ical Director for insur- 
ance company 10 years, 
recently wrote tho fol- 
lowing letter: 

“There is little ques- 
tion but what properly 
functioning Kidney and 
Bladder organs are vital 
to the health. Insuf- 
ficient Kidney excre- 
tions are the cause of 
much needless suffering 
with aching back, weak- 
ness, painful joints and rheumatic pains, 
headaches and a general run-down, ex- 
hausted body. This condition also in- 
terferes with normal rest at night by caus- 
ing the sufferer to rise frequently for relief, 
and results in painful excretion, itching, 
smarting and burning. I am of the opinion 
that Cystex definitely corrects frequent 
causes (poor kidney functions) of such con- 
ditions and I have actually prescribed In my 
own practice for many years past the name 
ingredients contained in your formula. Cys- 
tex not only exerts a splendid influence in 
flushing poisons from the urinary tract, but 
also has an antiseptic action and assists i» 
freeing the blood of retained toxins. Be- 
lieving as I do that so meritorious a prod- 
uct deserves the endorsement of the Medical 
Profession, I am happy indeed to lend my 
name and photograph for your use in adver- 
tising Cystex." Signed W. R. George, M. D. 




George 



Mti viun un a im&s* 


Hr. A. S. R. of New York City writes: 

”1 had 9 bald spots the size of a ha|f« 
dollar. 1 used Japanese Oil for 3 months 
fluid now my bald tpote are entirely 
covered with hair.” 


FREEH 


used by thousands for baldnesB, falling hair, loose 
dandruff and scalp itch. Price 60c. Economy size 
$1. All druggists*. 

National Remedy Co., 56 W. 45th St., DepL SS, N. Y. 


“THE TRUTH 
ABOUT THE 
HAIR’ 1 




beautiful girls' heads and figures for pleasure and 
profit. Be an artist and make big money. Amaz- 
ing NEW easy way quickly starts you. No experi- 
ence necessary. 

FIRST LESSON FREE 

Send name and address today and only 10c 
to cover mailing cost. TRY IT FREE. 

Towertown Studios, Dept. 10 
III North Canal St. Chicago, III. 



Prostate Sufferers 



An enlarged, inflamed or faulty Prostate 
Gland very often causes Lameback, Fre- 
quent Night Rising, Leg Pains, Pelvic 
Pains, Lost Vigor, Insomnia, etc. Many 
physicians endorse massage as a safe ef- 
fective treatment. (See Reference Book of 
the Medical Sciences, Vol. VII, 3rd edi- 
tion). Use "PROSAGER," a new inven- 
tion which enables any man to massage 
his Prostate Gland in the privacy of hi8 
home. It often brings relief with the first 
treatment and must help or it costs you 
nothing. No Drugs or Electricity. 



DR. W. D. SMITH ** dUUKLL 1 

INVENTOR EXPLAINS TRIAL OFFER. ADDRESS 
MIDWEST PRODUCTS CO., B-300, KALAMAZOO. MICH. 




Employment for 

500 Men at Once! 

A revolutionary Chemical Sponge has just been in- 
vented that cleans cars like magic. Banishes auto- 
washing drudgery. Also cleans linoleum, woodwork, 
windows without work ! Auto owners and house- 
wives wild about it. 

The manufacturer wants 500 men and women at 
once to help him introduce this strange chemical 
sponge. He offers to send one on trial to the first 
person in each locality who writes him. Send in 
your name today — also ask for full particulars on 
how you can get the Agency and without experience 
or capital make up to $90 a week. Address: 
KRISTEE EV3FG. CO., 713 BAR ST. f AKRON, OHIO 



Please mention this magazine when answering advertisements 



ADVERTISING SECTION 




STOP Your Rupture 
Worries! 

Why worry and suffer with that rupture any 
W longer? Learn about my perfected invention. 
N It has brought ease, comfort and happiness 
to thousands by assisting in relieving and 
curing many cases of reducible hernia. It 
has Automatic Air Cushions which bind 
land draw the broken parts together 
las you would a broken limb. No ob- 
TiT1I ^ r n J noxious springs or pads. No salves or 
r v rHtiMbt* plasters. Durable, cheap. Sent on trial to 
* ‘ * prove it. Beware of imitations. Never sold 

in stores nor by agents. Write today for full information 
sent free in plain, sealed envelope. 

H. C» BROOKS. 57 8-R State St.. Marshall, Michigan 



TYPEWRITER 

I E 1 k only lOt a Day 

new 
rying 
,ut 

iW 



Not used or rebuilt. A new 
Remington Portable. Carrying 
case free. Use 10 days without 
cost. If you keep it, it’s yours 
for only 10c a day. Write 
today. Say: Tell me bow Ii 
can get a Remington Porta-" 
fele on 10-day free trial offer 
for only 10c a day. Reming- 
ton Rand Inc., Dept.BS-3, Buffalo, N. Y. 



LETS GO PLACES 




AND DO THINGS 

Feel young again — full of ambition and 
pep. Take Bico-Brasil Mate’. It picks 
you right up. Makes you feel like 
Doing places and doing things. Keeps 
your system free from the poisons that 
slow you up. No need to act OLD or 
feel OLD if you use Bico-Brasil Mate' 
three times a day. Improvement no- 
ticed in 24 hours. Endorsed by Doc- 
tors and Scientists. Month's supply for 
$1.00 by mail, postpaid. With "Folder of Facts.” (Will Send 
C. O. D., if Preferred.) 

Brasil Laboratories, 147 E. 47th St., N. Y. City. Dept. 13 



T*C DON’T BE CUT 

II §■* ^ Until You Try This 
AUUl^ Wonderful Treatment 

™ for pile suffering. If you have piles in any 
form write for a FREE sample of Page’s 
Pile Tablets and you will bless the day that you 
read this. Write today. E. R. Page Co., 
2315-B Page Bldg., Marshall, Mich. 



IVO'I' 

HOUSE- 
BROKEN ! 

Wo call him Scotty. When your guests 
put cigarettes in the ash tray — and pat 
Scotty’s head he’ll raise his little hind 
leg and PUT OUT THE CIGABETTE. Convenient water 
sack inside Scotty is easily filled. At last a canine’s most in- 
convenient habit has been turned into a practical and ex- 
tremely funny use! Scotty mounted on ash tray — both in 

attractive bronze finish. 

Scotty may be had for fl.BO postpaid. Money back if not 
completely satisfied . Remit to 

HOME GADGETS 

Dept. 147 200 Fifth Ave. New York City 



ONLY 

$1.50 

each, delivered 





[I WOK 

Rj7C5°-° 



Now Hnawirefe More Prizes Being Given 
ANYE5M3Y MAY WIN 

This is our sensational new way to advertise — giving away 
big cash prizes — besides thousands in EXTRA cash rewards. 
Not a cent of your money needed now or ever to win $2,500. 

Can YOU Find 4 Dogs 
its Pactiage Above? 

Tell me quick! Some are upside down. Some look straight at 
you. Hundreds have won big cash rewards in other campaigns 
conducted by men in this firm. Here are a few. Mrs. Kate 
Needham, a housewife in Oregon won $4,705. Ira Burroughs, past 
70 years old in a little Texas town won $2,770. Anna Jacobson in 
a small New York town won over $5,000. Sister M. Crescence in 
Arkansas won $1,490. Now comes your chance. You are GUAR- 
ANTEED to win a cash reward if you take an active part. Not 
a lottery. No luck needed. Hurry — get started quick by finding 
4 dogs. Not a cent of your money needed to buy anything. Big 
cash rewards are being won every day. In addition to giving 
Buick I will pay 



$1,000®.® EXTRA 



Sop Promptness 

to First Prize winner. Not only one person, but hundreds will 
be rewarded. In case of ties, duplicate prizes will be given. All 
the money to pay prizes is in the Bankers Trust Co. at Des Moines. 
I invite you to look us up through any bank in Des Moines, any 
credit agency, business house, magazine, newspaper, railroad. 



*10,000 M REWARD 



j will be paid to any worthy char- 

i ity if anyone can prove that we 

do not really give away allthese thousands of dollars in cash 
prizes — or that all this prize money is not on deposit in the bank. 



WRITE QUICK 

Send no money, Mark dogs found, clip picture, mail quick 
— or write on penny post-card how many dogs you find. For 
replying I will tell you how you may also win big EXTRA cash 
rewards and $2,50Q too. Answer NOW! . Tell me which you -would 
prefer to win — $2,500 all cash or Buick and $1,000. 

Merrold Johnson, Mgr. Dept, 40, Des Moines, Iowa. 



Please mention this magazine when answering advertisements 



ADVERTISING SECTION 



Jk Year* s Protection Against W dl A «\ § 

sickness Less titan 3c a Day! 



A Year*a Protection Against 

ACCIDENT 




You Can Decide NOW Which You Want 





You Can Novir 
Protect Yourself and' 
Family fer Only,*. 

•ld-AYEAR 
Under a Limited 
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Sf You Should Meet With 
SICKNESS or ACCIDENT 

You can’t tell what the future holds for you. No one in 
the world knows whether Sickness or Accidents await you 
just ahead. Few escape without accident — so you must 
prepare. You must take steps to protect yourself. 

RIGHT NOW is the time to decide! 

Yes., right now I Even while you are reading this page, 
some flood or Are, some automobile or train disaster, is 
taking its toll of human life or limb. And elsewhere, some 
contagious disease or sickness, is wreaking its havoc. Should 
some of this trouble strike you, which do you want to 
receive . . CASH or SYMPATHY ? Now you can take your 
choice, afterwards it will be too late. 



$25.00 W eekly to $10,000 Cash! 

In Case of Stated Accidents or Sickness or 
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COST $10.00 FULL YEAR’S PROTECTION. 

Won’t you have peace of mind when you know that shohld sudden 
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Make up your mind NOW to get Cash instead of Sympathy! 



m North American Accident Insurance Co. 5 

! * 535 Wallach Building, Newark, New Jersey, g 
Gentlemen : At no cost to me send copy of 

your booklet “Cash or Sympathy.” There is 1} 
B no oblisration. g 



Mail the Coupon 
today! 

Mail the Coupon 
before it's too late 
to protect yourself 
against the chances 
of fate picking you 
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tim. 



NO MEDICAl EXAMINATION 

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No Dues. No Assessments. 

MEN AND WOMEN 

16 to 69 Years Accepted* 

$ 10,000 

Principal Sum. 

$ 10,000 

Loss of hands, feet or eyesight. 

$25 Weekly Benefits 

for stated Accidents and Sicknesses. 



Doctor's Bills, Hospital Benefit, Emer- 
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to help in time of need— all clearly 
shown In policy. 

This is a simple and understandable 
policy — without complicated or misleading 
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word means — and every word means ex- 
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. S NORTH AMERICAN ACCIDENT INSURANCE C0.[ CA &*»] 

53S WALLACH BUILDING, NEWARK, NEW JERSEY 

■ Largest and Oldest Exclusive Health and Accident Insurance Company in America 
| Under Supervision of 48 State Insurance Departments 

. I ESTABLISHED O VER 47 YEARS 
Jjj Agents Wanted For New Territory 



Please mention this magazine when answering advertisements 









.... that's 
need to PROVE 
lean 

a NEW MAN.' 

Holder of the title: 

“The World’s Most Perfectly 
Developed Man” 

Won in open competition in the onlv 
National and International contests held 
during the past 15 years 

O NE week.! That’s all the time I 
need. In 7 days I’ll PROVE 
that I can make you over into 
a new man of vitality and power. 

I’ll do for you exactly what I did 
for myself. I was once a 117 pound 
weakling. T was sickly, only half alive 
had a flabby namby-pamby body. 

How I changed myself from this “below 
average” physique into the man who won — 
against all comers the title of ‘‘World’s 
Most Perfectly Developed Man” is an absorbing story. 

It is told in my book, ‘Everlasting Health and 
Strength,” which I will send you absolutely free if 
you till in and mail the coupon below. 

It’s Easy MY WAY 

Big claims mean nothing! That is why I offer yon 
more than promises. That is why I offer you a 7 
days’ trial of my famous method, Dynamic-Tension. 
That lets you see for yourself that I back up every 
promise I make. That PROVES beyond a flicker of a 
doubt that I can and will turn you, too, into a vital, 
powerful NEW MAN. 

Thousands of fellows all over the world have used 
my method — and now you can, too. Like them, you 
can put on firm layers of muscle where you need 
them most, tone up your whole system, banish consti- 
pation, poor digestion, bad breath, 
pimples and other conditions that rob 
you of the good things and good times 
of life, and get the “drive” that’ll take 
you to the top of the ladder. 

I’ve Got NO USE (or Apparatus 

I haven’t any use for tricky weights 
or pulleys and machines that may 
strain your heart and other vital or- 
gans. There’s nothing unnatural or 
artificial about this method of mine. 

And I don’t dose you or doctor you. 

Dynamic-Tension is all I need. It’s the 

natural, tested method for developing real men 
inside and out. It distributes added pounds of 
powerful muscles over your body, gets rid of ailments and surplus 
fat, and gives you the vitality, strength and pep that win you the 
admiration of every woman and the respect of any man. 



NOTE : No 

other Physi- 
cal Instruc- 
t o r in the 
World has 
ever DARED 
make such an 
offer ! 






charle: 



FREE BOOK 

Gamble a stamp today. Mail 



and Strength.” It shows you 
from actual photos how I have 
developed my Pupils to my 
own perfectly balanced pro- 
portions. Where shall I send 
your copy? Write your name 
and address plainly on the 
coupon. Mail it today to me 
personally. 



ATLAS 

Dept. 38-C 
133 East 23rd St# 
New York, N. Y. 

I want proof that Dy- 
namic Tension will make a 
New Man of me — give me a 
healthy, husky body and Mg 
muscle development. Send 
free book, “Everlasting 
Health and Strength.” 



Name 



Send (or YOUR Copy o( MY FREE BOOK R 

be held back by a below-par body! Now you can easily and H 
make this new man of yourself! Do what my thousands of 
pupils did — send for a free copy of my illustrated book, “Ever- 
Health and Strength.” Learn how T built myself up from a 
no-muscle, always-tired "runt” to winner of the title, "The 
Most Perfectly Developed Man.” Gamble a stamp to mail my 
learn how YOU can win the biggest prize in life — a hand- 
healthy, husky body. Address CHARLES ATLAS, Dept. 38-C, 
23rd St., New York, N. Y. 



(Please pfint or write plainly) 



Address 



City State.. 

© 1934 C. A. Ltd. , 









I'D GIVE MY LAST CENT 
TO GAIN WEIGHT AND 
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